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AMERICAN JUDAISM: 


THE RELIGION AND RELIGIOUS 
INSTITUTIONS OF THE JEWISH 
PEOPLE IN THE UNITED STATES 


A HISTORICAL SURVEY 


BY 


JOSEPH LEISER 





NEW YORK 
BLOCH PUBLISHING COMPANY, INC. 
“THE JEWISH BOOK CONCERN”? 
1925 





CopYRIGHT, 1925, By JosEPH LEISER 







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To My Teachers 


MAX and MIRIAM LANDSBERG 
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CONTENTS 


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RAPALA CEN Mei ee Cote kareccice nso faseeeha ING ele. ek bss, Hee teal sMancmaar glee tee 6 7 
MI EEEIL UIC ELON b uic coed ecatahs thee ters dein oe thin os ofa! 2 PRET areas ele Gos 11 
MAIN TRAVELLED ROADS OF JUDAISM.........-.-.0005- 49 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM.............. 92 
AMERICAN JUDAISM ........... Pow eta yD at eta ete states 123 
AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS.............0020000- 143 
Peta Ee MER ICANN Dab CVV ESS 5 ti ccs \al'y al el 2. 4 Wie ol a wie aia adele whale atale 174 
ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES............. 204 
REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS IN AMERICAN JUDAISM...... 242 


THE NEXT STAGE IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF AMERICAN 
SETI Ee NT eee rah at alae Ley OP tale eC cat AG i URC iS Mr en 269 








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PREFACE 


The Jewish people of America are developing a group con- 
sciousness. They are beginning to envisage themselves as 
American Jews. Many are longing for the speedy advent of 
that day when all distinctions between the various geographical 
classes of European and Asiatic Jewries that migrated here, 
will disappear and such terms as orthodox and reform, wholly 
abandoned. In their stead, it is anticipated that the more 
acceptable designation, American Jews, will be used when refer- 
ring to them as a religious people. Now, indeed, is the accepted 
time for the adoption of that designation as substitute for the 
previous labels wherewith the various factions of Jewry on this 
continent were wont to be classified: orthodox, conservative, 
reform. Zionistic, nationalistic and atheistic. For this reason, a 
survey of American Judaism has been essayed, as an organic 
unit, possessed with democratic potentialities. This is no 
vagrant phantasm but is becoming more articulate yearly. 

There is a well directed and definite tendency to ignore pre- 
vious differences of interpretation which heretofore divided the 
house of Jacob, in order to foster a more perfect union of the 
various Jewish sects in America. A greater uniformity is 
desired to the end that more unity may be obtained. But uni- 
formity and unity are two different things. An increasing 
definiteness of purpose is likely to animate all the Jewish 
inhabitants of these United States. The need of coercing the 
various groups into a strait-jacket of conformity, either of 
doctrine or construction, is not so imminent. Conformity will 
come to pass by the process of evolution inherent in the Jewish 
spirit, since at its core Judaism, however practiced, is essentially 
identical, 

The ambition of the following chapters is to outline in a 
measure the content of this American Judaism. These pages 
intend to afford a plausible statement of that aspect of the 
Jewish religion come to consciousness in this country now with 
more distinctiveness than elsewhere—in fact with more unique- 
ness and more responsive to the contacts and situations of democ- 
racy than in any other country. 


7 


8 PREFACE 


To project this statement it was necessary to survey the 
field of Jewish consciousness historically. There is a vast his- 
torical background to American Judaism, the condition prece- 
dent to the settlement of the Jews on this continent, without 
which their destiny here would have been cast in totally dif- 
ferent lines. To ascertain the permanent values of American 
Judaism now vigorously challenged by the racial groups is the 
outstanding purpose. The approach of this consummation has 
been through the antechamber of Reform Judaism. In proffer- 
ing the content of American Judaism due recognition is herewith 
made of the presumption of the task and inadequacy of the 
projector’s ability to clothe it in proper vestment. 

American Judaism shares with all phases of Judaism in the 
application of concreteness. To illustrate in life the dictates 
of conscience is the Jewish way, even as God is represented as 
both saying and doing. The deeds of loving kindness, those 
benefactions wrought in behalf of humanity, identify Judaism 
here and elsewhere. As doctrine, Judaism is incomplete. Nor 
is Judaism an abstraction of philosophy, ethics, metaphysics 
or science. Judaism is more than a religion. The Jews are 
a people immersed in a historical purpose. Encompassing and 
incarnating them is the duty to labor for the establishment of 
the kingdom of God, a Messianic ideal which can be interpreted 
in modern sociological terms as social welfare, social conscious- 
ness, or the commonwealth. 

The American Jews have been forward looking and positive. 
But it were futile to deny the recoil of those progressive mea- 
sures which initiated the Reform Movement in this country. 
Judaism in America is in the throes of reaction. Whether 
war’s aftermath or disillusionment, it is no longer denied that 
the ideals of the XIX century have proven sour grapes for 
the children of the Twentieth. Evolution, education, democracy, 
individualism have each in turn evoked doughty opponents. 
Even political government has not escaped critical examination 
and censure. Could Judaism, so interwoven with the zeitgeist, 
be unaffected by the chilly blasts of reaction? Attention is 
directed to the reactions evident in American Judaism in pre- 
cept and in practice. 

Complaint has been registered against the shifting of leader- 
ship in Judaism. In ages past, the prerogative of the scholar, 
poet, philosopher, theologian and rabbi was to lead. Study 


PREFACE 9 


was considered of greatest importance because study leads to 
practice, Rabbi Akiba observes.* 

This situation is analyzed and the endeavor made to explain 
the “advent of the layman” (an un-Jewish term), who by inject- 
ing business methods in the administration of Jewish activ- 
ities, subordinates the religious content and intent of Judaism 
to the financing of his philanthropies. 

The unique feature of American Judaism is in all likelihood 
the American Jewess. Without currying favor with a spurious 
gallantry, it may truthfully be said that America has accorded 
the Jewess greater opportunities than any other country. Ameri- 
can Judaism released her for self-realization and service towards 
her humanity. It is now generally admitted that her works do 
praise her in the gates. 

A historical movement enduring as long as Judaism can well 
afford to project the next stage of its development. This 
forecast is the veriest conjecture. But this, one may confidently 
state: Judaism in America tends to become identified with the 
national consciousness, since the two are twain, flesh of its 
flesh, and bone of its bone. 

And now, as these declarations go forth, let the reader bear 
in mind that the ulterior motive has been to “write a story” 
about Judaism in America, as if it were a newspaper assign- 
ment the writer had to “cover.” There has been possibly 
a background of scholarship but no library has been available, 
no “research” after accepted academic standards followed. The 
endeavor has been to fill the heart of American Jews with a 
love of their heritage and a pride therein, and also to implant in 
the hearts of their fellow American citizens a respect for the 
descendants of those poets, prophets, lawgivers and martyrs, who 
throughout all ages strove to establish peace, justice and the 
love of man for his fellowman. 


1 Kaddushin, 40B. 


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INTRODUCTION 


The Jews of America are in the throes of a critical situation, 
as some allege, by reason of the resurgence of anti-semitism 
in this country. Race-hatred combined with religious prejudice 
is becoming as bitter and menacing here as Jew-baiting in 
Europe. Our circumstances and conditions of living have not 
yet paralleled the horrors suffered by our Jewish brethren on 
the continent, yet calamity is predicted to befall us here as an 
inevitable reaction of war’s aftermath. Its frenzy victimizes 
the Jew because he is unlike his fellow men, albeit in the last 
war his blood flowed as freely as theirs in that wasteful and 
needless holocaust, and because he has always proven to be 
a handy scapegoat. The out-cropping of anti-semitism in the 
United States, whatever the source of its origin here, is a 
frightful disillusionment as well as un unforeseen deflection from 
American traditions and democracy. American Jews had ac- 
cepted with certain literalness the Declaration of Independence 
and the subsequent right of religious freedom which Jefferson 
had incorporated in the Constitution. The Jewish people of 
America concluded that these declarations were the laws of the 
land, enacted in a sincere effort to wrest man from the handi- 
caps of racial and religious prejudices. Until the Civil War, 
America was reasonably free from the stigma of race-hatred 
such as prevails in Europe and even now in Asia. So far as 
the Jews were involved, there was slight evidences of it, although 
the American people were not entirely unbiased in their 
attitude toward other races, the Irish for example.1| But from 
Civil War times to our present era the Jews of the United 
States are conscious of an increasing dislike of them on the 
part of their fellow-citizens, for no reason that can be accu- 
rately tabulated, although many theories have been set forth to 
explain it.? 

_ This blight is disheartening, and overcasts the future of Ameri- 
can Jewry with ugly clouds of forebodings. Yet anti-semitism 

*The “Know-nothing” party, forerunner of the Klan, was race-hatred 
directed against German immigrants, chiefly. 


* Roots of Anti-Semitism, by Horace M. Kallen. “The Nation,” March, 
1923, 


11 


12 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


is not the most serious affliction of American Israel, since it 
is admitted that the lot of Israel in America is not an unmixed 
blessing. This prejudice may become a fatality unless the dire 
forces of persecution are stayed. When race-hatred links arms 
with an economic boycott in the sinister manner organized 
agencies of violence now rampant in this country propose, the 
Jewish people here may become as economically imperilled as 
their brethren of the faith are in Poland, where measures of a 
similar character are instituted. Stealing one’s livelihood 
approaches the category of assassination. It is the craven trait 
of the buzzard feeding on the carrion slain by other. hands. 
Any phase of race-hatred, no matter against whom directed, is 
un-American. Yet Israel confronts a peril of greater proportion 
than the ugly hulk of anti-semitism. The possibility of this 
latter peril becoming an actuality instigated the composition 
of these chapters of exposition relative to the content of that 
religious heritage which gives the Jew his name and habitation 
in the spiritual as well as material realms. How that religious 
spirit is being manifested in this country at the present time is 
the burden. 

The term, American Judaism, is a fortuitous expression, geo- 
graphically descriptive of its physical area with scarcely any 
more significance. It is therefore, merely rhetorical. The religion 
of the Jews has been unfolded in sundry ways in various 
quarters of the globe, and in widely separated ages: Alex- 
andria, Egypt; Andalusia, Spain; Safed, Palestine. From the 
compilation of the Mishna, 200 A. D. to the adoption of. the 
Pittsburgh platform in 1885. The “shelsheles hakkabalah,” the 
chain of tradition, has never been broken, albeit severely 
strained. All Jews are bound together by this mystic: cord,’ 
wherever they wander their religion follows, a cloud by day, 
a pillar of fire by night. Always employing the terms vital to 
the age and locale where it comes to consciousness, Judaism 
is explained in the idiom current in whatever country the. Jews 
sojourn. It is not now an original product of inspiration in any 
country under the sun. It is merely a manifestation of that 
spiritual urge upsurging from the heart of Israel wherever they 
happen to be. Hence, to speak of a particular national Judaism, 

* This bond of union applies to those members of Israel’s household who 


accepted the “yoke of the Torah” and abided by the decisions of rabbis 
and the popular codes of Rabbinical laws. 


INTRODUCTION 13 


such as American Judaism, however felicitous and chauvan- 
istic, is merely provincialism. For, strictly speaking, there is 
no American Judaism of local invention. There is a Judaism 
manifested in the consciousness and illustrated in the conduct 
of Jewish people living in America. 

This very carelessness of speech, an error into which many 
of us fall, is symptomatic of the superficiality characteristic 
of our period. How is it likely to be otherwise, when our 
minds are fed by the hasty and inconsiderate items usually of a 
nationalistic or Zionistic coloring, which appear in our Jewish 
papers? These random items do not exceed the importance 
of gossip accorded conversation in a cafe. Instead of thought- 
provoking and scholarly material, the readers are provided with 
a sort of pabulum of no more value than mere conversation. 
These journalese collections are an extension of alleged “human 
interest” topics into trivialities. Readers are told that certain 
prominent personages in art, theatricaldom, commerce, litera- 
ture, even commercial sports, are Jews, and this fact is suffi- 
cient warrant to publish any statement about them. Whatever 
happenings are reported in the Jewish papers gain the light 
of publicity for the sole reason that certain persons involved 
are Jews by birth. To some of these, this is, as Heine said, 
their misfortune. The thing cited is not mentioned because it 
illustrates a principle or ideal of the Jewish religion, which is 
more important than the accident of birth in a Jewish family. 
Quite the contrary. Nothing of a philosophical character, with 
rare exceptions, and little that pertains to Jewish literature as 
a depository of the expanding tradition of Judaism is printed. 
This very essential material is, for the most part, ignored, 
in favor of frivolous persiflage on man and events. Men and 
women and events are trumpeted because, by the hazard of 
chance, one or the other happens to be Jewish, or are con- 
sidered to be so by reason of their birth. Whether any one 
is vitally concerned in Judaism does not matter. 

Such inconsequential tidbits of information as this, that a 
noted moving-picture actress was confirmed in a synagog, or 
that the champion light-weight pugilist is a Jew, (granted that 
it is important in this era’of violence that there be among Jews 
men handy with their fists) are given wide publicity, but these 
picayune trifles do not add to one’s appreciation of the Jewish 
religion, nor give one a penetrating insight into the vision of 


14 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


Judaism. “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge,” 
said Hosea,* and in this age there is a woeful deficit of ignor- 
ance in Jewish religion, theology and ethics. There might 
be a wider, at least a more assuring. understanding of the inten- 
tion and profession of Judaism in this country, were the 
sources of information more abundant.’ Were mere racial 
allegiance and social station less essential to the editors of Jewish 
papers than the ideals and visions interlocked with the Jewish 
people, there might be a more enduring knowledge of Judaism. 

While there will always be differences of interpretation, the 
several divergences of opinion and ‘construction—and these 
will be shown directly—there might be a fortuitous concurrence 
of interpretation on the underlying intent of that manifestation 
of Judaism now unfolding and developing in this country. 
Whether as race Jews or a religious people, we have a common 
destiny here. Whatever service is exacted of us by the state, 
political government is not a finality, but a process, also through 
which the spirit within us seeks to corporealize and materialize 
the ethical urge toward right doing, which is the very essence 
of Judaism. For the end of Judaism is to sanctify, to hallow 
life, and all that is involved in and pertains to the human 
being. Judaism in America is our American Jewish method 
of applying the intent of Judaism to our daily lives here. 

It is assumed that a reasonable concurrence of opinion on 
the general content of Judaism might fortify the Jews of this 
country in hours of peril. It is further presumed that the per- 
manent value of Judaism in this country will be compatible 
with our national institutions and ambitions. To explain this 
harmonization or functioning, and what has been wrought to 
illustrate the application and operation of the Jewish spirit in 
this land has occasioned these studies. 

The danger the Jews of America face is the menace of dis- 
unity in the central concept of their purpose and mission. There 
does not prevail a tenacious grasp of the fundamental purpose 
of the Jewish religion and the Jewish people. Lack of def- 
initions is not serious, nor is a definition of American Judaism 
even desirable. No miracles were ever invoked to establish 
the plausibility of a commandment, our sages observe, and one 

“Hosea, 4:6. 


*In his address before the Jewish Congress, Zangwill spoke in a sim- 
ilar vein. 


INTRODUCTION 15 


does not require the crutch of a definition to sustain Judaism. 
It is not necessary to define it. In fact, Judaism cannot be 
defined, any more than poetry can be stated in axiomatic terms. 
In truth, Judaism is more than a religion, and more is 
embraced by this term than the usual connotation associated with 
the word, religion. This inability to define in unvarying phrases 
the essence of Judaism is not a short-coming. It is its great- 
ness and grandeur, since it permits a renewal and re-statement, 
in other words a constant growth. Therefore the lack of defini- 
tions is not the peril of the hour. 

~The most ominous peril arises from the incoherence of con- 
struction. There is no inner agreement anent the function of 
Judaism in the survival of the Jew and his struggle for exis- 
tence. The interpretations of Judaism current are not so many 
different view-points as they become contentions in which one 
construction is personified as a menace to the other. A liberal 
Jew is now held up to ridicule by nationalists, conservatives 
and the neo-chassidim or pietists. The desire on his part to be 
American and to permit the spirit of his religious heritage to 
work through him, as he constructs it, is regarded as a species 
of apostacy by the nationalistic Jews. Race Jews deplore all 
adaptations of local customs, all unconscious assimilation of 
environment, which is one of the most outstanding psychological 
traits of the Jewish people, and has ever been their wont. This 
antagonism is not confined to nationalistic or anti-Zionists, but 
persists among other groups, it will be shown. 

When the youth of American Israel, college graduates, in 
many instances, of either sex, stigmatize Reform Judaism as 
the greatest menace in the history of Judaism, opposition reaches 
its worst. It is unblushingly charged by some of those intel- 
ligentsia that Reform defiles the tentacles of mysticism whereby 
man “cleaves unto God.” It is well to survey the contention 
and profession of this religious interpretation and ascertain 
what are the formulas of faith underlying the synagogs of 
America. If it chances to be the tremendous menace averred, 
Reform Judaism is fatal. But is it? 

There is at present no alignment of purpose among Ameri- 
can Jews. They are thus deprived of the operation of a morale 
such as they experienced in older countries and in other days. 
Orthodoxy, in former historical periods, furnished a morale. 
It had a set program of conduct. But such a program is not 


16 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


possible now amid the conflict of destinies. For the construc- 
tion put on Judaism by each member of the covenant directly 
affects his or her life. It matters much how one projects life. 
It does matter what one thinks. In the end it matters a whole 
lot whether one regards the religious inheritance of his fathers 
as a refuge from the storm of life such as Zionism or a high- 
way through the world as Reform Judaism. It matters much 
whether one believes in fellowship with men as historical Juda- 
ism postulates, or segregation therefrom as the nationalistic 
councils of Jews prescribe. 

There have always been various religious parties among the 
Jews: without mentioning obscure references to sects in Bib- 
lical days such as the Rechebites in Jeremiah, there have been 
within historical periods: Sadducees, Pharisees, Essenes, Mas- 
sorites, Saborayim, Sopherim, Karaites, Chassidim, Rabbinites, 
Mystics, Kabbalists, Messianists. In our day we have Zionists, 
conservatives, orthodox, reform, ethical culturists, “Jewish sci- 
entists’—even this list is by no means exhausted. Among the 
various groups there persists a coherence of identity: all are 
fractions of a larger historical group, having in proportionate 
measure, a certain residuum of likemindedness whereby each 
respond to tradition and react to the complexes of their com- 
mon ancestry.© This inheritance, shared by each, enjoins cer- 
tain practices by means of which one group recognizes the 
other as was the wont during the Diaspora through the medium 
of rabbinic Judaism. Among all therefore stretches the blue 
cord of their Jewish ancestry; body and soul; religion and 
people. 

Under pressure all Jews announce their affiliation with the 
people of Israel. Persecution tends to congeal them as cold 
blasts of oppression, invariably draw together people oppressed. 
In periods of peril the harassed phalanxes are concerned in 
breasting the foe. Theirs the business not to argue nor to 
ask the reason why. Theirs the business to stand shoulder to 
shoulder and not question the policy of formation or analyze 
the origin of the tactics. These manoeuvers do very well in 
imminent peril. But it would be hazardous to perpetuate a 
policy of indefiniteness of purpose. To rely solely on this resid- 
uum of tradition and common memories as the bond of union 


°This is due to the acceptance of codes and rabbinical decisions of the 
Jews throughout the Diaspora. 


INTRODUCTION 17 


among the Jews of America would in the end produce no 
united statement of purpose nor evolve a technique for the 
discharge of duties in accordance with American idealism and 
democratic concepts. And that is the most essential need. 
Now is the appointed hour to set forth the contents of Judaism 
as constructed in this country not as an apologetic but as an 
exposition of ideas, principles, doctrines and attitudes that con- 
stitute American Judaism.’ It would be well for American 
Israel to know the elements compounded in that nourishment 
which has kept them and the spirit within them alive, and it 
would also be well were their fellow-citizens to know the 
technique now being developed by American Jews to apply 
the lofty idealism of their religion to the operation of the demo- 
cratic principles of government. 

All streams of Jewish tradition have flowed in one direction. 
There is danger, however, that in America this phenomenon may 
not be duplicated. There are indications that the convergence of 
purpose induced by the technique of rabbinism and all phases of 
legalistic Judaism will not be maintained. Various groups are 
now actively engaged in undoing the endeavors of another. 
Rather than conspire to effect a new content for the rapidly 
exhausting formulas of reform and orthodoxy, alike, there 
is an avowed reactionaryism, a sort of Jewish “fundamentalist” 
movement which clamors for the “piety of the father’s” and his 
rigorous orthodoxy. It is not likely that there will ever be a 
uniformity of ceremonial here. Conformity in ceremonials the 
country over is not desirable. But if a solidarity of Israel is 
desired, the solidarity should rest on the broad basis of com- 
monly accepted technique whereby the American Jew can sur- 
round himself as with an aura. Such a commonly accepted tech- 
nique would provide the morale, which is of course the com- 
pacted pressure of public opinion in the group, the voice of 
tradition, and all that enters into the complexes of the Jew. 
A unanimity of morale is needed to the end that an interpre- 
tation of Judaism may be deduced that will explain the mean- 
ing of life to every son and daughter of Abraham in terms of 
American democracy. 

This unification of destiny has not been evolved because 
of the conflicting tendency of each group located here. These 
various groups subsist on the marrow of their heritage: their 
Jewish consciousness. Out of this common heritage there has 


18 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


now emerged an American Jewish morale, inspired by their 
American environment and as a result of their occupation in 
this new land and participation in the function of government. 
The elemental substance for an expression of Judaism, indige- 
nously American, are here. The Jewish spirit manifesting 
itself in this new land, would, judging from previous experi- 
ences, take on the semblances and complexion of American 
environment. But there have been thus far too many cross-cur- 
rents in the stream of tradition to enable formulization of those 
concepts predominant in the religion and life of American Jews. 
This is due, so it is opined, to the fact that various groups here 
fail to endorse a common program, and resent the professions 
of an American construction of Judaism. 

A large number, in fact the largest group, are the indifferent, 
unaffiliated men and women who belong neither to one faction or 
another; who are neither reform nor orthodox, Zionist, Yid- 
dishist or Hebraist; who are, in a word, nobodies. These 
camp-followers have always pitched their tents behind the 
tabernacles of Israel. If they have not perished it is due to the 
heroism of the remnant, whose martyrdom has vitalized them. 
They were found in the days of the Babylonian Isaiah, men and 
women perfectly content to build houses and dwell therein, 
and let the fanatics return to Jerusalem. It is a remnant like 
the Gershonites who do service and bear burdens in the tent 
of meeting, to whom we are indebted for the rebuilding of 
altars here. It is absurd to fancy that all Israel has been 
mightily agitated over the problems of ritual, philosophy, destiny, 
save in the days of stress. For the greater part of the year, 
seed time and harvest, one’s daily occupation, whereby those 
who do the work of the world, obtain the world’s reward, com- 
pose the anxieties of Jewish people. That there are men 
utterly indifferent and careless to the compulsions of their 
religion are factors with which one must deal. Despite the 
fact that this host are ineffectual and inconsequential, it is 
a pity that American democracy has produced such a bumper 
crop of them, The material advantages offered by this coun- 
try have stimulated the perpetuation of this group, whose 
existence is rounded by the satisfaction of the physical appe- 
tites and cravings of creature comforts. In political com- 
munities of other lands and generations, the spirit of the hive, 
“the mores” of the land, public opinion and social station 


INTRODUCTION 19 


enforced a certain religious morale on all members of the group. 
To separate one’s self from the synagog even in earlier cen- 
turies invited excommunication. This act of expulsion was 
no verbal terrorism, but a fatal hazard equivalent to a legal 
execution. In this country there is no effective community 
of opinion, a secondary manifestation of morale, to stigmatize 
the Jew for lapses in his moral or civic conduct. If one so 
desires he may depart entirely from his brethren and no one 
can stay his course, save his own conscience. If this has 
not been disciplined, he is lost. 

America has her share of “lost Jews.” In pre-Revolutionary 
days, and continuing unto this very hour, intermarriage has 
claimed a large share of Jewish men and women who have 
been blotted out. Intermarriage is often a means of escape 
from the “yoke of the Torah” for some. There are instances 
where intermarried couples have followed Jewish practices 
and allied themselves with Jewish people. Rabbinical pro- 
cedure establishes as the natural lines of affiliation in cases 
of intermarriage this rule: that the offspring follows the reli- 
gion of the mother. There are more cases where women of 
non-Jewish birth have been converted to Judaism in case of 
intermarriage than that of men. Still intricate as the problem 
remains for us as it does for Ibanez in his “Luna Ben Amor,” 
intermarriage has not been encouraged by precept or practice. 

Isolation in unsettled sections of the country has been another 
means of withdrawing Jews from the fold. Yet efforts to 
overcome this drift constitutes one of the achievements of Ameri- 
can Israel, and will be detailed in the proper place. Inadequate 
educational institutions, poverty, perversity and downright 
pugnacity in the large cities, to matters Jewish, have all com- 
bined to estrange an increasing number from the main army 
of Judah, to which may now be added the least excusable of all 
deserters and apostates the host of Jews who have gone over 
into Christian Science. 

This class have merited the severest contempt, because their 
apostacy is rooted in cowardice. Christian Science members 
are thus far free from persecution. Christian Scientists are 
the only Christian sect that have not butchered Jews for a 
Christian holiday. Entrance into this sect is often assumed to 
be an entry into social circles of the faithful. This, more than 
the doctrines, it is inferred, has captivated many American Jews 


20 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


and Jewesses. And these “meschumadim’’ forget that in 
Judaism there is a wholesome means of healing. The religion 
of the Jew never exalted healing as the end of existence. To 
do well, not merely to be well, was the Jewish injunction.® 
Health followed worth. A life worthily spent was one with God 
and shared in the goodness of God, who is without error, and 
hence free from the defilements, imperfections and mortal error 
of the human being. Christian Science, as a doctrine, has noth- 
ing startling for the Jew, lest it be the privilege of putting one’s 
feet under the dining room table of one’s non-Jewish neighbor. 
The attempts are many, it is true, to link the Jews of this 
country with their Judaism. In due sequence, the efforts put 
forth to rescue the drifting unaffiliated Jews with their separate 
communities, and the organized endeavors now functioning to 
revive Jewish and religious culture in all classes of Jews will 
be detailed. Yet there persists a large number to whom the 
heritage of the house of Jacob makes no appeal. For the first 
time in centuries, there is an open revolt against the synagog, 
as is the case with certain elements within the working classes.° 
The number of men and women who are unaffiliated with any 
Jewish organization, no matter what its nature, is appalling. 
In larger centers of population, it is ventured that fifty per 
cent of the Jewish inhabitants maintain no affhliation with a 
synagog. Smaller communities are more favored in enforcing 
affiliation with the synagog, and often rate as high as 100% 
membership. Still, small communities admit that many among 
the brethren refuse to join a congregation, for financial reasons 
in some instances, and sheer indifference in others. While 
membership in congregations has always been a primary con- 
dition of social existence and standing for the Jew, it is now 
becoming a matter of personal caprice. Men and women, the 
fathers’ and mothers’ sons and daughters of those who suffered 
martyrdom for the cause of Israel, now forswear the synagog 
without compunction or remorse. ‘The separation of church 
and state may be responsible for this cleavage between the 
" Apostates. 
§ Fully explained in Chapter IX. 
®Many among the Jewish laborers regard the Synagog as a symbol 
of class distinction. To them it represents the bludgeon of oppression 


yielded by the employing group to suppress the worker. Its liberalizing 
power is denied. 


INTRODUCTION 21 


unaffiliated and their spiritual shelter. Yet it is one of the 
saddening circumstances of American Jewish life that here, 
where the Jews have a larger measure of freedom and oppor- 
tunity for development than in any of the twenty-seven countries 
of Europe, there should be this voluntary estrangement. The 
example of Soviet Russia is no criterion. Conditions there are 
so alien to our own situations that they are not applicable. 
No parallel can be made nor deductions drawn therefrom.’° 


The indifferent group enjoy the re-enforcement of another 
segment of Jews living in this country, namely the Jewish %a- 
boring men and women who have come upon the stage of action 
in the last two decades, or within the present century. 


Industrialism is a new development of humanity, and there- 
fore our present age being chiefly commercial and industrial 
has brought to pass conditions entirely new in the historical 
experience of Israel. For centuries the Jew occupied the posi- 
tion of middleman. According to Prof. Warner Sombart in his 
“The Jews and Modern Capitalism,” the predominant features 
which distinguish modern capitalism from mediaeval trade and 
_ industry are directly due to Jewish influence. Whether or not 
the Jew can lay this flattering unction to his soul, it is none 
the less true that he has quickened international trade by the 
large scale of their trade, and the variety of wares and the 
introduction of new commodities. In Jacob’s “Jewish Contri- 
butions to Civilization” a full description of the routes taken by 
Jewish merchants in the Middle Ages is given. The Jew, as 
it is shown, was an intermediary, carrying the produce from 
the east to the west and transferring the products of the west 
to the east, going as far as China. Emerson said that commerce 
consists in transporting things from where they are made to 
where they are needed. This function was reserved for the 
Jews as a result of historical circumstances. Hence, at the 
opening of the Nineteenth Century (as far back historically as 
necessary to retrace) industrialism was in its infancy. It too 
displaced other forms of economy, as Beatrice and Sidney Webb 
show in “The Decline of Capitalistic Civilization.” At the 
establishment of the American Constitution, 1789, the Jewish 
settlers, retaining their economic status from the Middle Ages, 


” The Soviet Republics recognize the class struggle—in which economics, 
not ethics, dominate and control conduct. 


22 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


were in the parlance of modern business, “retailers.” There 
were professional men among them, scarcely any farmers and 
probably among mechanics only tailors, locksmiths, jewelers, 
shoemakers, carpenters and cigar makers. 


In the evolution of industrialism throughout the nineteenth 
century, manufacturing tended to engross the attention of Jews 
instead of commerce. Industry in general experienced many 
changes, and each affected the economic status of the Jew. At 
the beginning of the Twentieth century it is evident that the 
manufacturer who hitherto depended on the merchant to distrib- 
ute his products can also act as distributor, and these two 
economic functions tend to merge. That is to say, the maker 
is now organizing his “plant” so that he, too, may be qualified 
to sell, thus dispossessing the distributor, or middleman, and 
eliminating his services in the exchange of commodities. Hence 
the rise of the large mail-order houses, department stores, co-op- 
eratives, chain stores. Often these are the distributing depots 
of the manufacturer. The middle-man is being gradually 
uprooted by the interplay of these economic forces that seek a 
level of lesser resistance. Just as language tends to abbreviate 
words, syntax and sentence, so commerce and industry seek 
an economy of action. 


The significance of this process of eliminating the entrepeneur, 
so far as the Jews are concerned, is self-revealing. it means 
that the role of middle-man hitherto assigned him in the eco- 
nomic drama is being discarded. Like Othello, they find their 
occupation inherited from the Middle Ages gone. In all parts 
of the western world, from Lodz, Poland, to Cleveland, Ohio, 
and westward to the Golden Gate, the Jews are being shunted 
into manufacturing and industrial lines. There is now a class 
of Jewish working men and women. Adequate statistics on 
this score are not available. Dr. G. Deutch attempted to compile 
some statistics on the subject in his essay, “The Jew in 
Economic Life, with Special Reference to Poland.1 Therein 
one finds that the organizer of the Cloakmakers’ Union authority 
for the statement that out of a total of 140,000 people employed 
in that branch of work fully 110,000 are Jews. There are Jewish 
carpenters, bricklayers, paper-hangers, plumbers, bakers, stove- 
makers, auto-mechanics, truck-drivers, printers, bookbinders, 


oe SreBkac, Ci Ar Ri Vol; xX Mae pescos ie 


INTRODUCTION 23 


even motor-men and conductors, also policemen and letter 
carriers.?? 

The Jewish working man and woman is now a considerable 
element. And yet this class in many instances announces openly 
secession from the synagog. The function of the synagog, so the 
organizers and leaders argue, is now supplanted by their trades’ 
unions, their “arbiter band,” their locals. These labor organ- 
izations substitute the services rendered by the synagog, the 
Jewish worker now contends, and hence they forego that insti- 
tution. 

The locals of the Trades’ Union are enlarging the scope of 
their organization. Originally these were wholly concerned 
in problems arising from their craft, such as wages, conditions, 
and hours of labor, superintendency, hazards, compensations, 
black-listing, enforced unemployment, child-labor, apprentice- 
ship. A trades’ unionist had accepted the dicta that labor was 
not life, but a part of life, a commodity that could be bought 
and sold. The assumption that a man’s labor is a piece of 
merchandise, salable like any commodity in the open market, 
is now being abandoned. More people concur with John Ruskin, 
who posted the dictum: “There is no wealth but Life.” At 
least the restrictions that hedged in the activities of a union 
within the limits of its craft are being lifted, and they now 
assume functions previously delegated to other professions. They 
edit newspapers (The New York Leader), establish colleges, 
maintain banks, engage the services of physician, dentist, lawyer, 
nurse; establish summer camps and recreation resorts; build 
houses. They are experimenting with grocery stores, dairy 
depots and meat shops. As it is they care for their sick, feed 
the hungry of their group, clothe the naked and bury their dead. 

In discharging these and kindred functions, the spokesmen 
of the Jewish working classes content that they are fulfilling 
the function of religion enjoined on them by the synagog in so 
far as the synagog insists that of the three pillars on which the 
world stands, study, worship and benevolence, they are dis- 
charging two, namely benevolence and study. And furthermore, 
so they argue, in their pilpulistic casuistry, they appropriate 
even the function of prayer in the formula quoted from Simon 
the Just (Abot. 1.2.) by showing that to labor is to pray; the 


“To this host must be added an increasing number of Jewish farmers. 


24 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


word which in Hebrew means prayer, “abodah,” likewise means 
work. Hence all three functions of the synagog, they allege, 
are now incorporated in the locals. These labor leaders avow 
that they have outgrown religion as a function essential to 
man’s discipline, and claim that in economic determinism relig- 
ion, history, art are explained and expounded. 


The Jewish working man forgets that the application he is 
making of his trades’ union or local was first inculcated in the 
synagog as reported in the morning service of a Singer’s Stand- 
ard Prayer Book.* It was there that he learned “honoring 
father and mother, the practice of charity, timely attendance 
at house of study morning and evening, hospitality to wayfarers, 
visiting the sick, dowering the bride, attending the dead to the 
grave, devotion in prayer and making peace between man and 
his fellow; but (and this is overlooked usually) the study of 
Torah is equal to them all.” In other words, the synagog 
implanted these ideals of service toward humanity he now 
attempts to realize through the medium of his “local.” It is 
the source whence he draws the waters of benevolence. 


The “local” furnishes an organization to effect ends previously 
functioned through the organizations attached to the synagog. 
He has not evolved a new source of energy. He has changed 
his organization which, in order to be energized depends on a 
central dynamic source, and this central source of energy is 
the synagog. If he cuts himself off from it his spiritual energy 
will slacken. He will wither and become seared in the dry 
winds of his own selfishness, forgetful of his humanity. For 
the synagog always rolls up the curtain of the universe and 
insists on each member of the covenant of Israel beholding 
the entire world whereon all peoples are struggling and striving. 
It reaches out in love to their fellow-men and labors with them 
for bread of life14 The vision of the “local” gradually dims 
when it becomes separated from the spiritual group whose tradi- 
tion is sweetened by the honey of humanity. It becomes self- 
centered to the verge of brutal selfishness, and converts man 
into a clod without a throb of compassion. It is now so class- 


** Singer’s Standard Book of Prayer, p. 4, ff. 

%* No Jew to-day regards his fellow American as a heathen or pagan. 
The fact that all their fellow American citizens worship the same God as 
the American Jew is a basis of mutual respect. 


INTRODUCTION | 25 


conscious that the larger concern of humanity is lost in the 
clash of sordid craft interests and mere physical satisfactions. 

While “poverty becomes the Jew as a red ribbon a horse,’ 
impoverishment has never been the badge of his tribe. Poverty 
has never been extolled as a virtue whose reward will be 
allocated in the future world. On the other hand, gluttony, 
indulgence of any sort, has been severely condemned. Chastity, 
moderation, self-control have been enforced by innumerable 
precepts and examples. Neither poverty nor riches have been 
vaunted. These conditions have not been the ends of existence. 
Rather the study of Torah exceeds them all. And by Torah 
is implied culture, art, education, and the refinements that effect 
justice and promote opportunities and benefits for all. This 
has been the striving and ambition of Judaism—to hallow life. 
Fancy a trade’s union setting up as the acme of its achievement 
the hallowing of life for all humanity. 

From the days of Moses unto our own hour, the Jew has been 
made aware of this, that man does not live by bread alone. 
This the local forgets. 

The working class increases from year to year. Their influ- 
ence may now be infinitesimal. Barring immigration, the Jewish 
workers, using the term descriptively, are bound to become 
greater in number and significance. Unless the influence exerted 
by those other locals is counteracted and another policy pursued, 
their estrangement from the synagog is bound to ensue. What- 
ever religion has been to other peoples, Judaism has never been 
an opiate’® to Jews, as Soviet Commissioners insist on stigmatiz- 
ing religion. Through his Jewish heritage the Jewish worker 
will be led into the path of life and, willingly following therein, 
find that reward which is allotted to each mortal. 

In their present attitude, the workers constitute a formidable 
group, whose antagonism to the intentions of American Judaism 
are openly hostile, frank, and often violent. 

Another group whose aim is in direct conflict with that of 
the liberals are the nationalists, that is, the Zionists. They, as 
well as the trade union locals, are not in sympathy with Ameri- 
can Judaism, and find in the idea of Israel’s mission which forms 
the very soul and life force of the Jewish people as illustrated 


’ 


% It must ever be borne in mind that Judaism is more than a religion. 
An ampler destiny is assigned the Jewish people as will be explained and 
shown. 


26 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


in its history and religious literature one of the ridiculous “pre- 
tensions of Reform Judaism.” 

Zionism is a familiar topic among all Jewry. There is no 
need to disguise or minimize the redemptive features of this 
movement. It has been the means of restoring many who had 
strayed from the fold to their brethren of the faith. It has given 
purpose to those who walked in the dark places of doubt; dignity 
and self-respect to those who fawned and cringed before alleged 
superiors. All this is now so familiar that. to repeat it is 
boredom. 

And yet Zionism is at heart a movement that is incompatible 
with American democracy. It sets up the fiction of a Hebrew 
race which Dr. Fishberg, in his volume, “The Jews” disproved 
beyond all peradventure, and seeks to launch in the diplomatic 
waters a Jewish ship of state. Both creations are discredited 
in science and literature, in history and the liturgy. The con- 
tention of Reform Judaism that the Jews are only a religious 
people is a deduction, the Zionists say, of German metaphysics 
with which they will not pact because they hate the Jewish 
people and their descendants who hail from Germany no less 
vehemently than they despise any metaphysics evolved in the 
brain of a German Jew. 

The Jews are a race, is the primary assumption of Zionism. 
An accident, or the circumstances of history, deprived them of 
the patrimony of their ancestral homeland. They are the vic- 
tims of outrageous misfortunes and more so because they have 
failed to girdle themselves with the cord of a warring Judah, 
and chose instead the thorny path of missionary to humanity, 
unbidden and uncalled. So long as Reform Jews insist on 
foisting their metaphysics on humanity instead of their militia, 
they will be hounded across the continent of Europe and prob- 
ably America, say the Zionists. Convinced that the Jew belongs 
to his Hebrew people more than he does to his own Jewish 
religion, the Zionists began to summon the host to storm Zion’s 
hill. It was originally a political adventure, of this there is no 
doubt now that the record is written. Many pilgrimmed to 
Palestine to restore her waste places. It has become a home- 
land for many who are now satisfied to sit beneath their own 
vine and fig tree, even if this be an eucalyptus. The fortunes 
of the world war decreed that Palestine remain a mandatory 


INTRODUCTION 27 


of the British Empire to which the Jews might migrate as they 
may, if they see fit, to New Zealand, Australia, Canada, or 
Ireland. Subjects of the British Empire, they will be accorded 
the civil rights of any accredited British subject of the realm. 
And that is all there is to the political status of the homeland of 
the Jewish nation. 

Zionism, therefore, occupies the status quo of a lost cause. 
The Jews, long the guests of the nations of the world, if that 
is the position they hold, are now destined to remain so and 
not hosts in their own country. 


For two thousand years, political nationalism for the Jews 
has been superseded by the far nobler service, that of servant 
of God. This is the insistence of Reform Judaism. Interweav- 
ing the historico-philosophical destiny of Israel as conceived 
of in exalted vision of the Deutro-Isaiah, with their conception 
of a world mission as developed through the centuries, they 
have clung to the notion that humanity is more than nationality. 
These views merge with the solemn aspirations voiced in the 
Afternoon Service of the Day of Atonement. Therein it is said: 
“That we might give witness unto Thee and glory into Thy 
name, Thou hast sent us unto all countries of the earth. Not 
as a sinner burdened with the penalty of his iniquity did Israel 
go forth unto the wider world, but his was the mission of the 
suffering Messiah. Leaving behind him his old home, the 
Temple, and its sacrificial cult, the pomp of the sacerdotal 
services, giving up the symbolism of the age of his preparation 
for his larger historical duty, he marched forth to found every- 
where temples of a truer worship and a deeper knowledge of 
God and to lead by his self-sacrificing devotion all mankind to 
the spiritual altar of atonement.’*® To this end all sons of men 
are called. | 

And yet Palestine still spells hope for the martyred 
sons of Jacob. The “Hatikvah,”?? the national song of Zionism, 
reverberates with the undying hope of myriads who agonize for 
Zion. Even in this new land where Israel assumed that the 
new birth of freedom bestowed tolerance for all men, lo, we are 
now witnessing the onflow of hatred rising as a tide against 
us, and as ominous. Who can stay its dirty waters? Who 


*“QOlath Tamid,” by D. Einhorn, Eng. translation, p. 198. 
™ Literally, “The Hope,” by Naphtali Hertz Imber. 


28 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


knows but that pogromism and hooliganism may overwhelm us 
as they flayed our brethren in other lands? 

It is manifestly absurd as it is impossible to curb the long- 
ing of those who seek a respite in this visionary realm of their 
spiritual ancestors. As Goethe sought refuge from the distress 
of the finite by a plunge into the infinite, so those embittered 
by the last full measure of brutality meted out by their various 
governments, set up their own throne. There are scores of 
cultured men and women who have foresworn all the comforts 
of our sophisticated society and pilgrimmed eastward the main 
travelled roads of yesterday, suffering all the privations and 
discomforts of a pioneer. Hungry and athirst they repaired 
the breaches in the wall of desolation. They are beginning to 
restore the waste places, whether to their former splendor or 
not, depends on one’s enthusiasm and then on the reliability 
of the account which attributed unusual luxuriance to a land 
that never did overflow with milk and honey. The dreamers 
never cease in Israel. I{ there are among American Jews those 
who wish to become Palestinians, no one can stop them, nor 
should they! 

But this desire rests on the assumption that the Jews are 
merely an ethnic group who have been despoiled of their nation- 
ality and country. In an age of fascism Zionists are reviving 
nationalism. Amid the terrific reactions of force and violence, 
and the insolence of race superiority, the Jews have a right 
to their own country, the Zionists allege, as other nations have 
to their own parcel of soil.1* This view the Reform Jews never 
sealed with approval. They proved that nationalism was merely 
a state in the development of Israel and had in this age been 
outgrown. ‘They styled themselves servants unto humanity. 
The medium of service was their national group with whom 
they are identified. They therefore lent nationalism a worthier 
goal than rabid patriotism. It was a means to an end, not 
an end in itself, which is often compounded of race-hatred and 
national pride. Man uses nationality to serve humanity, not 
to exalt his nationalism. The Judaism of the Jew was to draw 
the Jew out of his religion into a larger humanity in the later 
days. 

** All Zionistic debates are becoming rather passé. Zangwill and Weiz- 


man are still thrashing it out to amuse the intelligentsia. Humanity has 
passed on to more vital issues. 


INTRODUCTION | 29 


The Zionists reject this messianic consummation. They were 
a nation, they said, whose homeland was Palestine and whose 
language was Hebrew. National existence long denied must 
now yield to self-determination. He must secure a legally estab- 
lished home. In the wake of that will follow the pride and 
self-respect of a dignified burgher. Whatever America meant 
to German Jews, to Zionists, America was merely a stepping 
stone on the journey to their own independent national real- 
ization. 

The movement has now subsided. As a political adventure 
it has ceased. Even their leaders concede that. What remains 
is the “Keren Hayesod,” an American project which is making 
it possible for those wishing to live in Palestine to do so. By 
practical schemes of engineering, such as the Ruthenberg electri- 
fication project, it may become possible to introduce small manu- 
facturing and industrial plants there. Any one who wishes to 
dwell in Palestine ought to be allowed that privilege. Sentiment 
is stronger than reason, and sentiment often dictates vital 
courses. Zionism has become a sort of philanthropic enterprise. 
In the effort to make the land of the fathers a refuge for those 
who seek it, as an escape from the brutality of Christian Europe, 
a generous support has been evoked. 

Whether the creation of a British mandatory in Palestine, with 
the consequent subordination of national self-determination, as 
originally intended, in the establishment of a legally secured 
home-land, will result in disarming Zionists of their zeal for 
things Jewish, is speculation. Rewon to the cause of the Jew, 
the Zionists who no longer see the possibility of a nationally 
secured home-land in the British mandate may now champion 
Israel’s age-long battle for justice. No definite statement has 
been issued, however, nor have any movements been inaugurated 
whereby one might infer that the Zionists in America have 
undertaken any other task than that of supporting the philan- 
thropic scheme of rehabilitation in Palestine. 

The Zionists have been active in this country for a quarter 
of a century. Within that time there has come to the fore 
another group numerically smaller, but to a slight extent an 
offshoot of them. There is in the biological field aberrations 
from normalcy known as “sports.” There are also in religion, 
Jewish and non-Jewish, similar deflections. There has been 


30 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


freakish formation in the Jewish organism, so to speak. The 
natural unfolding of the spirit is recorded in history and in the 
literature produced by the Jews—prayers, poems, piyyutim, 
homilies, ethics, commentaries, diaries, “responsa,” apologetics, 
fiction—these compound the organic substance of Judaism. As 
an index of the Jewish spirit, the literary productions of the Jew 
must be surveyed as a Leopold Zunz surveyed them, in a 
scientific attitude. With a methodology such as he and Abra- 
ham Geiger used, Jewish literature will reveal an unfolding of 
the genius of the people. The many varieties of literature 
produced by Jews have this in common: through all runs a 
red and blue cord, vivid with the martyrdom of Jewish heroism 
and the consciousness of priestly appointment to service at the 
altar of humanity. The main thesis of all this literature is the 
hallowing of life and confession of the realities of life excepting 
in the case of the Kabbalah. The mystical strain in Judaism 
dates back as far as Ezekiel, it may be. Among all mystical 
literatures there are evidences of attempts to escape reality. 
A group, coming to consciousness in our own day, is of the 
mystic gender, and like their predecessors are endeavoring to 
flee from the wrath of the world of the actual. 

There have been mystic sects among the Jews, as is intimated, 

of which the Essenes are probably a type, and the “Anshe 
Maaseh” mentioned in the Talmud, another. “Jewish mysti- 
cism,” says J. Abelson in his book on the subject, “is really noth- 
ing but commentary on the Jewish Bible, an attempt to pierce 
through to its most intimate and truest meaning, and what is 
the Bible to the Jew but the admonisher to be loyal to the tra- 
ditions of his fathers ?’’!* 
. This ambition, while it may explain mystics in Galicia and 
other European countries during the 16th, 17th and 18th cen- 
turies, does not characterize the modern Jewish mystics. While 
these modern mystics claim that mysticism is a consciousness 
of the indwelling of God in the soul (which is not mysticism at 
all, mysticism being psychologically a repudiation of the stimuli 
and the setting up of impression independent of reality)—the 
force of this movement has its inception in a protest against 
Reform Judaism. 

The religious construction put on Judaism by the Jews of 


* Jewish Mysticism, by J. Abelson, p. 32, ff. 


INTRODUCTION 31 


German antecedents is now abused by a third generation, as a 
movement sterile and cold as a haughty beauty who is conscious 
of her charms. Reform Judaism, say these critics, lacks fervor, 
warmth. It is barren of emotional elation, and anaemic, and like 
Rachel refuses to be comforted, much less bestow comfort and 
consolation on hearts sorely troubled. Rationalism and intel- 
lectualism, they say, has despoiled the venerable mother of her 
adornments, which are her ceremonials. Science and the dreaded 
truthfulness of knowledge has used the scalpel of psychoanaly- 
sis to rip the seams in the fair gown of devotion. How can a 
true mother in Israel retain veneration for the home ceremo- 
nies such as kindling the Sabbath lights when the irreverent 
mind of science exposes the rite as an emotional elation so 
closely akin to sensualism as to invest the rite with unholy 
aspects? How can Israel’s Torah be piously exalted as it is 
on the Sabbath when the women of Israel who “bring religion 
into the home” and “spiritualize the synagog” are told that this 
law God did not give to Moses. This is a fiction, disproved by 
Biblical criticism beyond the peradventure of a doubt! The law 
is an evolution of centuries.”° 

In like devastating manner, other ceremonials (dietary laws, 
circumcision, ritual baths, etc.) have been deflowered of the 
aroma of veneration leaving these ceremonials as empty as shells. 
Reform Judaism is thus guilty of actually robbing the Jews of 
ceremonies which have been tabooed or outlawed. In thus 
depriving them of an amulet, there has been a vacuum caused 
in their souls. This gap must be filled by the reality or con- 
sciousness of God, who must be brought back into their lives 
from some external source, super-imposed, not evolved or out- 
drawn. 

This modern coterie of mystics would isolate Judaism in the 
Jew and distill it to a spiritual essence which can be imbibed 
like a narcotic. In this state of ecstacy induced by an injection 
of distilled spiritual essence, the addict is uplifted on wings of 
religious fervor. High enthroned he, or in most instances she, 
is able to “cleave unto God” and, forgetful of the world out- 
side, wallow in waves of emotionalism and hysterical excitation, 
all induced by this intoxicant or soporific of mysticism. 

In this act the addicts are utterly oblivious that this indul- 


® Folk-Lore and the Old Testament, by Frazer, p. 435, ff. 


32 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


gence is undisguised paganism. Reform Judaism protests against 
this debasement of Judaism, and has always insisted that the 
function of religion is social service. Religion is a natural me- 
dium in man, it holds, and insists that we are in part what God 
is in amplitude. By worship we recognize our kinship with our 
Father and our duties toward man. These obligations towards 
our humanity are social appeals for collective action, and coop- 
eration in all affairs of humanity. 


Mystic sects have been germinated in Judaism at various 
periods. The composition of a book like the Sefer Yezirah 
(Malter’s Life and Works of Saadia Gaon, p. 180) indicates that 
there was a tendency to invest speculation with mystical ele- 
ments in the early centuries of our era. But mysticism has 
never taken root in Israel, no more than the saints of Sefed 
during the 16th century”! influenced the hosts of Jacob. Mysti- 
cism is individualism gone to seed. The vitality of the Jewish 
revelation, its resiliency and flexibility, is the continuity of the 
appeal addressed to the group in behalf of the community. 
Mysticism inculcates a selfishness that is antagonistic to the 
primary assumption of Jewish ethics, namely, loyalty to their 
covenant with God, which enjoined service of loving kindness 
in behalf of man. “May we never forget that all we have and 
prize is but lent to us, a trust for which we must render an 
account to Thee—that we may consecrate our lives to Thy 
service and glorify Thy name in the eyes of all men,” is a Jew- 
ish aspiration found in Union Prayer Book.*? Hence mysticism 
has never found wide acceptance among the Jews who will have 
none of its “spirituality” so often allied to sensuality and often 
induced by emotional excitation of the sort the mystics new and 
old cultivate, as Davenport explained in his “Primitive Inhibi- 
tions in the Religious Revival’ and James in his “Variety of 
Religious Belief.” 


Suspecting that mysticism is a necessary ingredient to infuse 
in the religion of American Jews, it is finding staunch advo- 
cates among those who in this late day are stirred to spiritualize 
the synagog, an endeavor as closely approaching a monstrous 
absurdity as any movement ever initiated in the fecund genius 
of the Jew. Spirituality in the sense employed by the mystics 


= Studies in Judaism, by S. Schechter, Vol. I, p. 3, ff. 
* Union Prayer Book, p. 67. 


INTRODUCTION 33 


is pagan, neo-platonic and Paulianian. It presumes a disunity 
of matter which the Jew never accepted. The world created by 
God is a totality not bisected into things of the spirit and that 
which is not of the spirit; of the earth, and therefore earthly, 
and of heaven and therefore heavenly. All God’s acts are just 
and done in uprightness. “The work of His hands are truth 
and justice” (Psalm III:7). This world created by God is full 
of His spirit and this is revealed in man. In the words of Isaiah 
this spirit of God is the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the 
spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear 
of the Lord (Isa. XI, 2). By the spirit of God man is given 
mastery over material things and provides wings for his imag- 
ination. Thus is released the creative impulses wherewith man 
constructs a world of ideals and holier splendor, as poet, archi- 
tect, scientists, as teacher, statesman, lawgiver, journalist, author 
and worker. In the eighteen Benedictions, one directly following 
the three praises of God is devoted to wisdom and knowledge; 
“Thou favorest man with knowledge and teachest mortal under- 
standing. So favor us with knowledge, understanding, discern- 
ment, from Thee. Blessed art Thou, O Lord, gracious Giver of 
Knowledge.” 


This world, then, is God’s creation, His spirit is in it. Matter 
contains the impress of His spirit. Matter is therefore ensouled 
and to be used for the welfare of man. This is the only sort 
of spirituality that Judaism knows: the spirituality lodged in the 
act of laboring together with one’s humanity to establish peace, 
beauty, happiness, here on earth. 


The piety of the fathers, so vaunted these days, consisted 
in their conformity to the ritual of practice. The pious Jew 
is he who obeys the commandments and does them. There 
was virtue in the fulfilling of these commandments. Those 
practicing them were enabled to live clean, chaste, healthy lives, 
in mind and body. They rejoiced in the fulfilling of the Lord’s 
commandments, enjoining as it did, the service of loving kind- 
ness. They clothed the naked, fed the hungry, and set the 
imprisoned free. They who did these things with a willing heart 
were far more spiritual than the modern detractors of Reform 
Judaism who would not lift a finger to serve their humanity 
lest it disturb the gusto of their emotional revel. This group 
prefers to cleave unto God in mystic embrace rather than soil 


34 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


their hands in joining with humanity in the work of the world. 
Deplorable as all this is, the saddest note is the implication 
that Reform Judaism, having stoutly resisted this aberration, 
is a baneful influence and “the most serious menace to the Jews 
of America.” 

These revivals wherein ecstacy and frenzy overlap benevo- 
lence and social welfare are not unknown in the religious history 
of the Jewish people, a phrase by the way that is not tauto- 
logical. The surprising feature of the religious revival among 
Jews, on the plane of individual elation, is not the phenomenology 
of the excitation and resurgence, but the locale of its manifes- 
tation, namely in the large centers of American Jewish popula- 
tion. In the old world, the hinterland, Galicia, Bessarabia and 
Safed, Palestine—obscure hamlets hidden in mountain fastnesses 
—harbored the illuminati of mysticism. It is now apparent that 
the upbreak of the Zionistic program as a political adventure, 
the shifting of aims from politics to philanthropy has been in 
a degree the cause of the revival of mysticism among our Jewish 
youth. These who have been deprived of the realization of 
their alleged nationalistic aspirations, their racial self-determina- 
tion, although this may not be the exact nomenclature employed, 
are now constructing within a world disassociated from reality, 
in order that they may experience in ample measure “the con- 
sciousness of the indwelling of God.” 


Nature abhors a vacuum, and so does Judaism. The Jew 
must be busy with one ideal or another. If he is ever so 
fortunate as to be without persecutors, he arises and lashes him- 
self for his sins. And yet the more he was persecuted the 
more he flaggelated himself on the eve of Atonement. ‘The 
Jew can not be contented with his lot. He is not by nature 
phlegmatic, and it is well that a driving energy pushes and 
drives him. His mind usually seethes with designs and inven- 
tions, wherein a fraction of that nervous energy wherewith he 
is endowed may be used to benefit and bless, be it the organ- 
pation of an international agricultural bureau, after the order 
of David Lubin, or the organization of cotton, tobacco, fruit, 
wheat and corn growers, after the design of Aaron Shapiro. The 
mind of the Jew is ever directed in channels of organization 
and concerted effort for a larger good,—for the commonwealth, 
in a word. The ambition of Zionists was commendable in the 


INTRODUCTION 35 


highest degree. It is a movement of heart as much as head. 
Now that the political Zionist is dead there is a hiatus, a vacuum. 
In the interim mysticism enthralls with its modicum of reason 
and the largeness of its fiction. 


From all accounts that have come to us of mystical practices 
in other eras, many rites and ceremonies of this cult did violence 
to Jewish tradition. Mysticism is individualistic instead of 
social; secretive instead of public, and inclined to cater to the 
subdued tones and dimness of cavernous depths instead of the 
frankness of all phases of Jewish worship. Picture a service 
in the synagog or home without the symbolic radiance of light 
and joy. Then conceive of the violation to the sanity of Judaism 
when a service is conducted in somber gloom! Such ritualism 
is more conducive to the seance with its charlatanry of spirit- 
rapping, gently rapping, than to the wholesomeness of a Jewish 
service. Then again: “The Shema should never be recited 
where it can not be heard by the ears of the worshipper,” says 
the Sifre.2* Hence the synagog has established regular prayers 
and appointed the special hours wherein not one, but a group, 
constitute the validity of the act of worship. 


Mysticism is, however, in keeping with the un-Jewish clamor 
for spiritual consolation, following the transit from life morta! 
of a dear one, that now invades most Jewish households. There 
has been of late undue concentration on the phenomenon of 
death among the Jewish people in the United States. Death 
is as natural as life and a manifestation of God’s wonders,” also. 
No man lives forever. Our little lives are rounded by an eter- 
nity, and yet each is so to live, in whatsoever way possible, 
that his life adds a mite to the common wealth of humanity. 
In living according to this construction, no labor is then com- 
monplace, no matter how commonplace it be. None is so exalted 
that it remains impervious to the common deeds of the masses. 
By their labor the mass of humanity redeem themselves because 
action makes destiny. No one lives in vain, no matter how he 
lives—even a negative colorless existence by indirection points 
to a career of service as a model. Every one is needed by some 
one else, and so long as one is a friend, one is indispensable, 
said. Robert Louis Stevenson. The value of life is relative. 


* Midrash on Deuteronomy, commenting on Deut. 6:14. 
* The Function of Death, by George B. Foster. 


36 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


All life is holy and sacred. Life being so highly venerated 
among Jews, death is not an awful void and desolation, but a 
continuance of the spirit released according as one labored among 
men. Life and death both serve beneficent ends, just as night 
is as necessary as day, and cold as well as heat. 

It seems ridiculous to revamp hackneyed themes of this 
sort, but these reflections troop to mind when one examines 
the arguments that are now advanced to convert the service 
of the synagog which has ever been a stimulation to noble 
living, into a solace of somnambulency for the dead. 

Modern Jewish “laymen”, a word that cannot be acclimated 
among the Jews, who venture to counsel the rabbis and teachers 
of Israel in the gospel of American Judaism as they conceive 
it, insist that a rabbi should not console a mourner by reminding 
the bereaved that all God’s ways are just. Nor tell them in 
the sublime diction of the burial ritual that the Lord is a God 
of truth without iniquity, just and upright is He who loves 
man with an unbounded love and none whom can say unto 
Him, What doest Thou? The consolation of the Jewish prayer 
book may not be “spiritual,” in the commonly accepted conno- 
tation of this un-Jewish term, but it is Jewish and that is far 
better. The “laymen,” however, venturing to impart homiletic 
instruction to rabbis would have the teacher of Israel soothe 
the sorrowing heart of his congregants by lifting up the cup 
of Christological salvation, and in doing so “spiritually”, renaind 
his congregation that they who mourn may confidently expect 
to meet 

“Their Pilot face to face 
When they have crossed the Bar.” 


Many among modern saviours of Judaism, such as the “lay- 
man”, would have the rabbis convert Judaism into a kind of 
Christianity when death visits the home of any member of a 
Jewish congregation. They would have the rabbis discourse 
not on “Mishna” as was the fashion in orthodoxy Jewry but on 
the possibilities of the grief stricken family being reunited with 
the loved one now lost to them in this life and to tell them how 
this reunion may be effected. 

Judaism does not deny immortality. The righteous will not 
rest from labor, neither in this world nor the world to come, 
said the rabbis of the Talmud, but they will go from strength 


INTRODUCTION 37 


to strength.” The immortality the rabbis forevisioned was not 
developed along philosophical nor the scientific lines of a Sir 
Oliver Lodge. Theirs was an immortality conditioned in right- 
eousness. The righteous of all nations share in the bliss of the 
future world. Immortal life God implanted in us as He made 
His eternal law the portion of Israel and man. But this is not 
the sort of immortality preached by modern “laymen.” Being 
reunited with one’s loved ones is not immortality. It is a crude 
eschatalogy in which the aspects of resurrection prevail over 
immortality. As late as 1869, the Central Conference of Ameri- 
can Rabbis resolved that: “The belief in the resurrection of 
the body has no religious foundation in Judaism and the doctrine 
of immortality refers to the after existence of the soul only. 
The Union Prayer Book following the precedent of Einhorn in 
his ‘Olath Tamid’ changed the traditional formula of God as the 
Reviver of the Dead into the far nobler expression, ‘Who has 
implanted within us immortal life’,’ as Kohler shows in his 
“Jewish Theology.” 

This is the position of Judaism in the matter of death: a 
natural event as true and unfailing as the ebb and flow of tides. 
It is not within man’s power to stay it, therefore he must 
adjust himself to it and be unafraid. Death casts shadows of 
sadness over all, but life must therefore not remain sad. Judaism 
was never a religion of sadness. Laughter was never deemed 
sinful among Jews. Joy accompanied every ceremony. Hence 
the cup of wine and the light used in the ceremonials are symbols 
of joy and held in sufficient esteem to be signalized for a bless- 
ing. 

In consonance with the tradition of Judaism it comes with 
somewhat of a shock when the Kaddish recited usually in con- 
nection with bereavement, should be degenerated into an incan- 
tation for the dead on the part of those who are so superstitious 
as to recite it as a dirge. Such an act is unpardonable. The 
Kaddish is a segment of the daily service and has been styled 
an “exuberant doxology.” Herein Israel registered a trust in 
the eventual triumph of God’s kingdom which (it is now gener- 
ally recognized) is a Messianic phrase for what in modern term- 
inology might be called “A more perfect union”, a saner and 
more equitable social order than that which now fills the world 


> Berokot, 64a. 


38 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


with penury. The Kaddish recognized that no one lives in vain 
and that each one in his efforts to establish peace adds to the 
final consummation of this distant achievement. 


The orientation of the Judaism is messianic in this sense, that 
eventually a more perfect humanity will emerge from the con- 
flicting elements warring in the world today. Economically 
and politically, more democracy is to be the constitution of the 
social order, and to this end every one must strive, that a 
collective good, not an individual wellbeing alone, may prevail. 
Let it also be borne in mind that among the Jewish people, 
to acquire property is right and just, for in so doing man testifies 
to his own dignity and the value of labor. But nowhere and 
nohow is property, valuable as that may be, set above the 
worth of human life. Even the generation of the flood were 
granted a week wherein to repent ere Noah and his retinue 
repaired to the ark, and had they repented, so the rabbis inti- 
mate, the Lord would not have destroyed the world. To jeopar- 
dise or debase life in preference to property is and always has 
been sinful. “For this reason was man created one and alone 
in the world: to teach that whosoever destroys a single soul is 
regarded as though he destroyed a complete world, and whoso- 
ever saves a single soul is regarded as though he saves a com- 
plete world.’’® Each one of earth’s children hastens the advent 
of the Kingdom of God in so far as he bends his individual 
selfishness to the general good. Not to digress, let it be here 
recorded that the Kingdom of God mentioned by Jesus is a fore- 
shadowing of this messianic advent. Dedicating life to a general 
good instead of an individual acquisitiveness lends purpose to 
each one’s labor. He who so lives invests his or her existence 
with godliness. One then becomes an instrument, or in Biblical 
terms, “A servant unto God”, for the ultimate realization of 
that which God symbolizes. And what God symbolizes is a 
more perfect humanity—a humanity free from the brutality 
and hatred, the penury and perplexity which degrades us now. 
A rabid nationalism, fanatical patriotism, “hundred percentism”, 
all these vicious reactionary conceptions of outworn creeds and 
exhausted dogmas so rampant in our day, retard the advent of 
that fellowship of mankind to which all peoples are eventually 
to render homage. 


7° Mishna, Sanhedrin, 5b. 


INTRODUCTION 39 


These then being, by and large, the aspiration and outlook of 
Judaism, certainly those essential principles of American Juda- 
ism, the deflections from the stream of tradition which flows 
through us as exhibited in these groups thus far analyzed, are 
far from comforting us. Political Zionism being declared “dead” 
as Zangwill in his speech before the Jewish Congress (Oct. 
14, 23) announced, there is imminent need for another interest 
to substitute the upbreak of the Zionistic movement. There 
is as urgent a demand for the participation of all Israel in 
America to counteract the inroads of race hatred, bigotry, alien- 
ism, hundred percentism, and the propaganda of half-truths 
hounded across the continent of Europe. There is need to-day 
of united effort grounded in a consistent theology, if you please, 
of American Judaism to generate an effective morale. The 
liberal group gave promise in early days of effecting this morale. 
They have not been reenforced by the younger generation who 
charged them with divesting the Judaism of tradition of the 
poetry hymned by that tradition. Reform Judaism is fully as 
poetic as traditional Judaism. It dreams dreams and sees vis- 
ions. What can be more poetically visionary than the messianic 
dream of a Utopian world purged of the dross of selfishness, 
race-hatred and rabid nationalism? Reform Judaism has modi- 
fied the metric beat of traditional Judaism and replaced it by a 
free versification, a poetry nevertheless keyed to the measure 
and beat of our own era, and uplifting as any poetic emotion 
come down to us from yore. 

The nationalists denied this and their denial is now sustained 
by a new group of romantically-minded young men and women 
who see in the advocacy of an historical development of Judaism 
an implied protest against the glamor of their racial grandeur. 
To this alleged grandeur they burn the incense of their mysti- 
cism and inhaling its fumes suffer the effects of a narcotic. The 
nationalists denied the priority and supremacy of the religion 
of the Jews. This recent group of malcontestants denies the 
process of continuous growth maintained by those who interpret 
Judaism historically. The last-born group regard growth as a 
fatality. The sublimity of Judaism among this group of intelli- 
gentsia lodges in the finality of the product, not in the process 
of its growth or evolution. 


The religion of the Jew is not to them an “ewige werden” 


40 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


but a status quo, as revealed in the Torah given at Sinai. This 
Torah, so argues this youngest group of Reform Judaism prot- 
estants, was a guide-book of direction. Its paths were paths of 
pleasantness and all its ways were peace, the peace of submis- 
sion. Being a divine revelation, it contained guidance for uncer- 
tain feet. It was authoritative and issued commands like a 
military dictator which men and women had to obey. This 
Torah did not permit any one to do his “own sweet pleasure” 
but organized a program of duties which had to be discharged. 


Reform Judaism, the latest opponents claim, divests Judaism 
of authority. It provides no guides to direct weak and mortal 
man in the path that he should go. It catalogs no codification 
of rules and regulations which control conduct and behaviour 
in the minute details of contemporaneous daily existence. It 
has not published a blue-print of moral duties outlining what 
each man, woman and child should do. In other words, Reform 
Judaism is devoid of authority and consequently the Reform 
Jew having had no one to discipline him, is in the position of a 
child who has grown into adulthood without proper training. 
Reform Judaism will never be anything more than a meta- 
physical speculation of German trained rabbis and cantors, so 
these opponents avow, until it accepts the authority superim- 
posed by external beings, when it casts aside as a baneful influ- 
ence and a menace, the historico-philosophical visions of the 
prophets of Israel. It may then be in a position to accept the 
divine revelation which staked the course wherein each is to 
run in the game of life. See now how the Reform Jews go astray 
for lack of moral leadership. What American Israel needs above 
all other spiritual assets is moral dictatorship, a fascisti of legal- 
ism, revived to keep the sheep within the Jewish folds. There 
has been too much license, too great a leniency with the hal- 
lowed traditions of the fathers, too little mysticism and a certain 
laxity of ritualism which ended in a general weakening of the 
moral fiber. Thus say the young romantic orthodox fascisti. 


That in our modern world, 150 years after the bonds of ancient 
tyrannies had been sundered, there should now be a clamor for 
the mailed fist of dictatorship is a dismal exhibit of our vaunted 
civilization. Yet it is one of the glaring reactions of our own 
decade. History attests to similar reactions. The present decade 
is reactionary in the extreme, politically as well as economically. 


INTRODUCTION Al 


The most astonishing situation today is the repudiation of the 
philosophy, political, social and economic, of the XIX Century. 
Dictatorship is displacing democracy. There is an evident mis- 
trust of man and his ability to govern himself. He is suspected 
of innate disqualifications for self-control and education, The 
mass-minded hordes constituting the bulk of the nations must 
be “bossed,” it is claimed. In the light of that statement, wit- 
ness the mobs that are swayed by false prophets and the rise of 
the dictator lashing the sheep-minded followers into submis- 
sion the world over. 

That the religion of the Jews reflects the atmosphere and 
attitude of the world at large has been observed by many writ- 
ers.27. Renan and Leroy Belleau and even the anti-semitic cote- 
rie admit it, so it is natural that some of our younger set thrust 
themselves into the outspread arms of force and violence. They 
are like the trees that went forth once on a time to anoint a 
king over them. The trees said unto the bramble after other 
more favored varieties had been consulted, “Come thou and reign 
over us.” So the bramble said unto the trees: “If in truth ye 
anoint me king over you, then come and take refuge in my 
shadow; and if not let fire come out of the bramble and devour 
the ‘Cedars of Lebanon’” (Judges 9:15). 

In the course of its unfolding historical Judaism abrogated the 
binding authority of rabbinical codes. For a century this deci- 
sion was unchallenged. Yet this present generation witnesses 
the rise of those who demand a restoration of the binding author- 
ity of the rabbinical codes as a means of guiding and directing 
them. Within a century Judaism in America has for this group 
exhausted the appeal of the reform pioneers who endeavored to 
eradicate the legal formalism from the religious revelation. These 
early leaders sought to avoid the perfunctory discharge of a set 
of prescribed commandments the outward performance of the 
letter of the law and advocated instead a sanctification of the 
whole of life. All transactions, all activities, the employment 
and conduct of each one testified to the glory of God and extolled 
Him. Reform Judaism professed not a certified or prescribed 
set of behavioristic routines, namely, precepts and practices such 
as legalistic Judaism ordained. 


27 There is a rabbinical observation that to the children of Israel at the 
Red Sea, God appeared as a warrior; in the Beth ha Midrash, i. e. acad- 
emy, God appeared as a student of law. 


42 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


This was the ambition of the pioneer: to adjust himself to a 
political democracy by outdrawing the democracy in his relig- 
ious heritage; to extract the universal ethical applications of 
Judaism from the racial setting. Judaism was to him only 
national in origin. Its orientation and outlook, its purpose and 
destiny was universal. And Judaism as an abstraction is un- 
thinkable. Without Jewish people to enact and live it, Judaism, 
a metaphysical system, cannot prevail. The universal element 
was stressed that the ghettoism of the Jew might be ironed out 
of his soul. In the United States the Jew was brought nearer 
to his fellowmen and became one with them in citizenship. 


What Reform Judaism purported is outlined by Samuel Hirsch 
in his “Catechism.’** The purpose of a man’s life is to be the 
image of God here on earth, to give the fullest play and devel- 
opment to the divine energies of his mind. Since God is the 
fountain of all things and He called the universe into being, in 
the fullness of His love and wisdom, it behooves us, His co- 
workers, to engage in all good work from pure and unselfish 
motives. The farmer who tills his soil and causes it to yield 
its produce; the mechanic and artisan who transform the raw 
materials, the gifts of God in nature and fit them for the uses 
of man; the merchant who by his toil lightens the burden of 
others and helps to supply their wants; the scholar whose 
researches finds new truths and kindles the light of reason in 
others, all of these are creative. They realize their divine like- 
ness, if in their work they strive to fulfill the purpose of their 
life. Religion embraces the whole of life and thus the entire 
scope and compass of life passes under the control of moral law 
which is the basis of the “Ethics of Judaism,” as Lazarus shows.2° 
Our religion embraces the whole of life, as the religious pioneers 
showed. It was not merely a discharge of special duties, but a 
life dedicated to a service, not ourselves, and makes for right- 
eousness among men. It is the common, collective good of the 
political group in which we live and have our being. 


This robust stimulant is rejected by the younger group, who 
find that Reform Judaism cultivates an ever increasing laxness. 
They want instead, as an American Jewess wrote in the London 
Jewish Chronicle of May 3, 1923, “faith.” “Reform Judaism,” 


* Reform Advocate, Vol. XLIX, No. 16, p. 523. 
*“The Ethics of Judaism,” by M. Lazarus, § 175. 


INTRODUCTION 43 


so they say in the glib gibber of hysteria, “has extracted all the 
substance, the rare sweet kernel of absolute faith, faith which 
orthodoxy brings, the fashion of giving one’s inner soul and 
heart and life to one’s faith. In the great temples of Paris one 
finds unswerving allegiance to the old rites and customs of the 
faith. In observing these old rites the observer becomes imbued 
with the enormous value of their Judaism, be it archaic or old- 
fashioned, as its modern reforms would so coldly deem it.” 

This attitude is typical of the intelligentsia of our day. Granted 
this group is interested in Judaism at all, it is not in the concep- 
tion of a dedication of one’s life to the hastening of that day 
when ignorance, superstition and hatred are banished. This 
does not form the basis of their interest. Religion is to them 
the extraction of the sweet kernel of absolute faith. The bland 
self-sufficiency and ignorance of this characterization of Juda- 
ism, such as the modern orthodox craves, is staggering. The 
old rites practiced by our fathers were never discharged as a 
matter of faith, but as a matter of duty in which they took par- 
ticular delight. As Schechter in his “Aspects of Rabbinical 
Theology’®® describes them: There was a certain rejoicing in 
the fulfilling of the commandments. They bore the yoke of the 
kingdom not as a matter of faith but as a mission whereby they, 
in their fulfilling the law, rendered holy the earth and all that 
was thereon. 

In common with many of the group who are pining for a res- 
toration of the dear old rites and ceremonies so impressive, 
none of which, it might be said in passing, would be carried out 
by any of the sentimentalists rhapsodizing them, the correspond- 
ent just quoted is hankering after the strong arm of the law. She 
and her school belong to the weaklings who must be “bossed,” 
and this squad is not confined to the political category alone. 
The movement is quite apparent. It is natural that an inter- 
pretation of Judaism in nationalistic terms leaves one without 
direction the instant nationalism is exploded. Reform Judaism 
is rejected because this school champions prophetic Judaism 
which made man supercivic, a servant of humanity laboring in 
a cause which was not himself, that made for righteousness as 
Matthew Arnold phrased it. Having no destiny, the group 
under examination clamor for something to engage them. They 


*® “Aspects of Rabbinical Theology,” by S. Schechter, p. 148. 


44 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


are not content with the program of democracy. They seek 
force and tyranny—the tyranny outgrown by Judaism they would | 
restore. 

That movement within the Jewish people which was labelled 
Reform Judaism is a direct continuation of the prophetic spirit 
which in turn was transmitted to the apocalyptic authors who 
transmitted it to the Pharisees and the rabbis of the Talmud. 
In substance, it is a protest against the dogmas of materialism 
and the anti-social deification of the individual but the forevis- 
ioning, instead, of the eventual destiny of humanity in the estab- 
lishment of what has been called from of old, “the Kingdom 
of God.” It means then that history has meaning. According to 
that conception, Israel is destined to play a definite and distinct 
part in the shaping of men’s minds and conduct, to the end that 
a reign of justice be brought to pass here on this earth. Into 
this task the Jew is born according to a divine plan. He, in 
association with his brethren, the Jewish people, labors for the 
realization of this achievement. 


There is more to this task than the formulas of a creed or the 
articles of a belief, because Judaism is not merely a religion; it 
is the historic assignment of a people to a cause in the {fulfill- 
ment of which they must preserve their identity. Being a group, 
a religious people, however, is not coextensive with nation. A 
nation connotes a political entity and Jewish nationalism has 
been politically extinct since 172 of the common era, while its 
revival expired in 1923. Reform Judaism stresses the mission- 
idea which is by no means absent in the sermons of the prophets 
or the homilies of the rabbis. It is sounded as well in the philos- 
ophy of the mediaeval thinkers. Reform gives it a stronger 
emphasis, and Reform Judaism developed its own theory of 
Jewish history in contrast to that put forth by the orthodox 
synagog. To them the exile of the diaspora (“golath”) had to 
be endured resignedly, God alone had decreed the trials and 
deprivation which Israel suffered, and in his own good time 
would end it. Against this view and interpretation of history, 
Reform Judaism advanced the counter proposition that Israel 
was sent into the world to witness to the truth for which this 
people of Israel had been identified, namely, the moral law, the 
Torah, that he, through his life, must glorify God or so live that 
his every act testifies to the living God. 


INTRODUCTION 45 


The fundamental conception of Rabbinical (orthodox) Juda- 
ism is legalism, normism. Judaism, the rabbinical orthodox 
claim, means obedience to the law as revealed on Sinai and pre- 
served in the Pentateuch. To this basis of orthodox Judaism 
there was this modification, the law revealed on Sinai had to be 
read in the light and by the aid of a second Law also revealed 
but orally transmitted. For the rabbis contended that all the 
commandments and statutes incorporated in the Mishna were 
also foreseen by Moses when he received the tablets of the stone. 
In this, as in Reform Judaism, religion is made coextensive with 
all human life. Religion, whether orthodox or reform, includes 
and embraces the totality of human existence. In that sense 
Torah was the sacramental term of the synagog and still is in 
reform synagogs. Every phase of life is under the sway and 
domination of religion and is inspired and inspirited with relig- 
ion. In other words, this means that every human being must 
be conscious of responsibility, human dignity, freedom and jus- 
tice. Justice is the keystone in the triumphal arch of Judaism. 
The content of the Jewish God-idea is compounded largely of 
justice. Through man God manifests his decree. Man and God 
are therefore not alienated but co-workers or partners, as the 
rabbis said, “Shutaph le ma’ash Bereshith.” To effect through 
this impelling thought and confliction the affairs of man is the 
historic task to which the Jew is called. 

Reform Judaism affirms the doctrine of man’s freedom which 
is a recognition in consciousness that God abides within us, a 
power able to master nature and superior to it. On the basis 
of a covenantal relation between God and Israel, responsibilities 
are postulated which are to be conscientiously carried out. The 
essential convictions of Judaism are rooted in this consciousness 
of God’s presence being manifest to us in all His works and in 
our own. It is thus a principle, not a precept, that man being 
endowed and enjoined to be a creator must work as, verily, God 
works. In work man realizes his creative destiny. Work is 
therefore not a curse. It is the “co-efficient of human dignity.” 
Work, as God works, “not for reward or to secure means where- 
with to buy pleasure, but work without looking to the fruit, 
work inspired by the consecrating purpose to increase the sum 
of human life and love, to subdue earth to the intentions of 
man’s destiny. So to live is the proclamation of Judaism as con- 


46 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


structed by the teachers of Reform (Samuel Hirsch for instance). 
The peculiar task is laid on the Jew to teach these universat 
principles of human conduct whereby men may live together in 
peace and enjoy the fruits of their labors, 

Thrilled by visions of his mission, the Jew finds in American 
democracy the medium whereby he lends himself to his human- 
ity. Humanity and Judaism are synonymous. There is nothing 
specifically Jewish which is not essentially human, and in the 
United States the Jewish people are liberated to verify this 
truth. 

Among the various groups that are now striving for mastery 
there are few championing that construction of life and Jewish 
destiny set forth by the reform leaders; and yet, paradoxical, 
if not quixotic, as it may appear, the liberal, prophetic or reform 
movement is the most compatible with democracy and is in fact 
an ally to it. For, as Walter E. Weyl shows in his New Democ- 
racy,** democracy is not in a final analysis a state at all but a 
mere direction and so is reform. As in Reform Judaism: “The 
social goal is the advancement and improvement of the people 
through a democratization of the advantages and opportunities 
of life and health, a democratization of education, a socializa- 
tion of consumption, a raising of the lowest elements of the 
population to the level of the mass.’’*? This is also the social 
program of American Judaism—it is in fact the social conscience 
of Judaism that inspired a “new” democracy. 

There is, it is true, an imperative need for a reconstruction 
of Judaism in terms of democracy, industrial as well as political. 
Democracy is by no means fulfilled. The despair now occa- 
sioned by the lamentable failure of democracy can be traced to 
its limited application. Political democracy alone cannot save 
the world from famine, war and penury. Democracy has need 
to be industrial and economic also. The new constructions of 
industry are destined to be more democratic, collective, co-op- 
erative, consolidated from the capitalistic side as well as the 
labor side. Here, then, is the task imposed on the Jewish people 
of America: to use the technique of democracy for the exercise 
and discharge of their Judaism. Political Zionism is dead, and 
territorial Zionism, such as the ITA is not functioning. Defunct 


* “The New Democracy,” by W. E. Weyl, p. 354. 
* Opus cit., p. 320. 


INTRODUCTION AT 


nationalism now craves employment in other domains—why not 
let American Jewry become democratic and American? 

What democracy offers the Jew of the United States is a tech- 
nique wherewith to convey or apply their Judaism. Democracy 
is a technique wherein to exercise the religious consciousness. 
It affords application for the urge or impulse inherent in relig- 
ion. Orthodox Jews in their codification of the laws and com- 
mandments, the ordinances and statutes, 613 in number, were 
obliged to fulfill, in order to merit sanctification, created a pro- 
gram. It was a mechanicalization of life in behavioristic terms. 
But it provided an outlet for the performance of activities in 
set formulas or ordinances. It soon became apparent that life 
could not be so regimented. Still orthodoxy maintained for 
centuries its technique and effected a morale, the result of that 
discipline enforced in the fulfilling of the law and command- 
ments, in all their detail and minutiae. 


Within the ghetto and Jewish pale of a monarchy orthodoxy 
could prevail. Contact with larger national groups in democ- 
racies forced the Jew to discontinue considerable ceremonial. 
It also enjoined conformity to the procedure of trade and social 
manners acceptable to the majority. One of two situations now 
confronted the Jew: either assimilate racially with national 
groups or evolve a new technique. This technique in a measure 
Reform Judaism provided. The Reform Jew of America now 
discharges his religious obligations through the medium of 
democracy with this additional obligation that upon him is laid 
the historical duty of illustrating these essential principles of 
democracy inherent in his religion, before all men. 


If Reform Judaism is bereft of the application of religious 
motivation, that is to say, if worship, prayer-service, temple- 
attendance, and ecclesiastical ceremonial or an estheticism alone 
constitutes religion, then such aberrations would muddy the 
stream of tradition and would be as fatal as any act whereby 
force and violence, manned by national bigotry, deported the 
Jews from certain geographical eras of earth. The groups ana- 
lyzed in the foregoing paragraphs have been guilty of groping 
for a technique and that technique is now provided in the fullest 
realization of democracy. Yielding himself to this task and 
spending himself in behalf of democracy wherein his Jewish 
brethren have now cast their lot, they bear witness to the vis- 


48 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


ions of their ancestors of the spirit who first proclaimed liberty 
throughout the land. Thus their historical mission is, in a meas- 
ure, functioning. Their exalted hopes for the eventual triumph 
of justice and the dignity of man are the brightness of that illu- 
mination the Jew has been assigned to kindle in the world. He, 
more than any other national group, is the living expression of 
ethical monotheism and ethical monotheism corresponds to 
democracy. The aptitude for this democracy as historically 
traced in the literature of the Jewish people harmonize with 
what may be styled their genius. To save life and enhance it 
involves social conscience, and the social conscience the teach- 
ers of American Judaism have been quickening as did their 
fathers. 

The Jews who sought these shores brought with them the 
instinct for liberty and the heritage of freedom as an expression 
of life and a realization of one’s genius and career, which is the 
basis of democracy. They have labored with their fellow men 
for the commonwealth that this nation conceived in liberty may 
never perish from the earth. That this conception of Israel in 
America may be better understood, it. behooves us to examine 
in detail what American Judaism comprises and comprehends. 
The thesis whereon this examination is directed follows the 
simple outline of this interpretation, that democracy is a tech- 
nique most acceptable to Judaism, of which it is in the main 
Synonymous, and that in the abandonment of political Zionism 
as untenable, unattainable and unreal, the Jewish people of 
America need address themselves to the rehabilitation of Judaism 
in democratic channels. How the Jew has contrived so to live 
an American Jewish life and what instrumentalities he wrought 
whereby he attains this expression of his religion and citizen- 
ship, with its inevitable reactions and mistakes, is the burden 
of the succeeding chapters. 


MAIN TRAVELLED ROADS 
OF JUDAISM 


Judaism, in retrospect, projects the main travelled roads of the 
Jewish spirit, as well as the career of the Jewish people. Ob- 
viously no survey of American Jews or the religion thereof is 
complete or intelligible without a background such as historical 
retrospect. This is the purpose of the following pages, out- 
lining the main currents of thought that have been so identified 
with the Jews in their varied pilgrimages across the face of the 
earth as to be now regarded as their own heritage and particular 
possession, 

Briefly, it is a mere skeleton of Jewish history that is now 
essayed. The warrant for more elaborate details of those events 
in the history of the Jews from Biblical days to our own is not 
forthcoming in lieu of the abundant material extant on this 
subject. The outline given by Geiger in his “Allgemeine Ein- 
leitung in die Wissenschaft des Judenthums” is accepted? 
Jewish history, he says, is segmented into four distinct periods: 

The first is the free, untrammelled, unbroken revelation from 
within outward of the creative spirit manifested in the conscious- 
ness of God as recorded in Scripture. This Biblical period came 
to an end at the time of the Babylonian exile, although many 
influences therefrom permeated the successive generations that 
had been germinated at that time. 

The second period is the further development of the entire 
biblical heritage in which the spiritual content of the foregoing 
era provided the spiritual direction for the traditional fulfill- 
ment and expansion of those commandments and ordinances 
that were to make up the Mishna and Talmuds. 

The third period reworks the spiritual heritage of the fore- 
going era. It is the period of rigid legalism dominated by cas- 
uistry, the codification of transmitted laws and the whole scheme 
of life directed by ecclesiastical decisions. It is that historical 
period antecedent to our own, which emerged gradually from 
it and constitutes the present or fourth cycle. 


* Nachgelassene Schriften, Vol. I, p. 63. 
49 


50 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


The last period is that era of enlightenment which we in our 
conceit attribute to our present era, whose benefits the present 
generation is enjoying. It was initiated by breaking the ban 
of authority and the fetters of submission inherited from previous 
generations. It sanctioned and sponsored free scientific inves- 
tigation and its characteristic method is a critical examination 
of man’s intellectual inheritance in whatever realm these endow- 
ments have been transmitted. Yet, withal, there is a conscious 
relationship and dependency of the present on the antecedent 
periods. Through all ages in which Jews have sojourned, there 
is a tenacious unity in which that illumination of the spirit 
formed in the dawn of Jewish history still reflects its glow on 
the peaks towering in this present decade. 


The American Jews are thus linked to a long ancestry. Their 
historical lineage is so pronounced that, without a conscious- 
ness of this ancestry of which the present generation are direct 
descendants, American Judaism cannot be understood. Surely 
no one presumes to interpret events of any sort, political, eco- 
nomic, literary, without deference paid to historical forces. No 
man is what he is save through the influences that moulded his 
ancestors. Every one is what he is as the result of what his 
ancestors were, and this is particularly true of the Jew, whose 
continued historical existence is stretched over longer periods 
than any other group in western hemispheres. 

In appropriating, then, the phrase, American Judaism, to char- 
acterize that development of Judaism which has taken place in 
the United States, one must not let the impression prevail that 
a unique and totally unusual phase of the religious conscious- 
ness of the Jewish people has been evolved. This is not the 
case. The content and intent of Judaism evolved by the group 
dwelling in this country came to pass according to natural laws 
of growth, and in accordance with the historical unfolding of 
the religious revelation of Israel in the three preceding eras. 

American Judaism is a sequence of historical events, not an 
aberration, as the Jewish nationalists contend, and a shortcom- 
ing of “Golath” or exile from Palestine. Historical studies force 
home the conclusion that the Jews have always been susceptible 
to the influences of whatever environment they chanced to be 
situated in. This is true of the Biblical era (1 Sam. 8:5 seq.), 
and holds true today. Wherever the Jews live as integral parts 


MAIN TRAVELLED ROADS OF JUDAISM 51 


of a nation, a Judaism reflecting that nation’s characteristics 
will be germinated. Realms as far apart as China and South 
Africa have each produced phases of Judaism distinctly paro- 
chial, as travellers testify who have visited either locality. 

Referring to the thirteen exegetical principles? whereby the 
Torah is expounded, the first rule holds good in this connection, 
namely, the inference from minor to major. One is therefore 
justified in assuming that if changes pronounced and distinctly 
manifest in the sparsely settled communities of Kai Fu Chang 
and Johannesburg, the greater will be the radical variations of 
ritual and doctrinal construction developed among the three to 
four million Jews of the United States.’ 

The method of logic, however, need not be impaneled to verify 
this process of adaptation and adjustment in the ceremonial oi 
Israel. Traced to their sources, all the ceremonial formulas of 
Judaism are foreign. Judaism imparted a new content to the 
formula, such as the Sabbath, Babylonian in origin, and invested 
it and other religious rites borrowed from surrounding peoples 
with a new spirit. On the side of religious ceremonial Judaism 
is a composite where these distinctions are made which Renan 
insisted were needful regarding the Jews. There is no Jewish 
type, he said. There are Jewish types. There are many types 
of Judaism. An “only” Judaism is as unattainable as a hundred 
per cent. Americanism.* 


The adaptability of the Jew to his environment is a well 
recognized characteristic, if not a trait of the Jews. In his “Israel 
among the Nations,” Leroy Beaulieu accounts for the readiness 
with which the Jew merges with his political environment. This 
French apologist of Israel adduces these facts to disprove the 
notion that the Jews are alien to that nation among whom they 
happen to dwell. He points out that assimilation prevails among 
the children of Abraham with the result that they absorb their 
environment and reflect it just as the student of intellectual 
movements is able to trace the various fashions of philosophy 
by® consulting the literature of the Jews. 


~ *Singer’s Prayer Book, p. 15. 

’ Brief compendium of Rabbinic law was prepared by Moses Isserles 
(1520-1572) for the practice of the German Jews, thus showing that seg- 
ments of Jews had special ritual rites and ceremonies. 

*The Religion of the Semites, by Robertson Smith. 

5 The Reform Movement, by D. Philipson, Chapter I. 


52 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


With more detail, and according to the labyrinthian devices 
of the laboratory, Dr. M. Fishberg has in his volume “The 
Jews,” proven by skillful measurements that the Jew in al! 
ages becomes a reflection of the peoples among whom he dwells. 
Says he, “We have seen that today the bulk of the Jews who 
have lived for centuries in Africa present predominantly an 
African physical type; those in Asia are mostly of Asiatic type, 
and the European Jews are mostly of the anthropological types 
met with among the European races.° 

The children of the third and fourth peneranien of American 
Jews are, by photographs and measurements of skull and limb, 
of color of hair and eyes, reproducing the lean, lithe physique 
of American youths. The anthropologists whom Dr. Fishberg 
quotes, claim that the athletic build of American youths is in 
turn a national atavism, and that the present generation of 
American children is reverting to the stature and figure of 
American Indians. 

That the children of American Jews should resemble Ameri- 
can Indians might lend support to the curious legend circulated 
in the hinterland of this country among the scriptural literalists, 
who nourish the delusion that the alleged lost ten tribes of 
Israel were the remote progenitors of red men whom Columbus 
found possessing the land.’ 

The justification of American Judaism according to biology is 
invalid if not superfluous. The religion of Judaism is a cause. 
It is non-material, and cannot be explained by the rules of 
natural science nor by rationalistic methods. It is a spirit, to 
be brief, the not-self. Judaism represents the ascendency of 
spirit over matter. Physical laws cannot explain the phenome- 
nology of Judaism. An American Judaism has been engendered 
not merely by reason of the Jewish population dwelling here, 
which would be a purely physical outcome, but from causes 
operating from within the soul of Israel. 

The Jewish religious consciousness drawn out and exercised 
in this country is the result of natural historical processes which 
have always been operative among the Jews. To accuse Ameri- 
can Jews of perpetrating a whimsy in evolving their American 

*“The Jews,” by M. Fishberg, p. 515. 

This is the dogma of a sect calling themselves Danite Israelites. They 


like the “Adventists” keep the Sabbath and Passover, but in theology are 
Christian. 


MAIN TRAVELLED ROADS OF JUDAISM 53 


Judaism, as the Jewish nationalist argues, is to display an ignor- 
ance of history ill-becoming those who seek to lead people. 

In the light of their origin, and by the very nature of their 
Jewish consciousness, conceived collectively, the American Jews 
have taken on the aspects of this country to which they now 
profess, and justly, a sacred devotion. Correctly construed, 
which is to say, reading Judaism in terms of a spiritual revela- 
tion instead of a nationalistic excursion, the religion of Judaism 
is supercivic. A national American Judaism is no confession of 
weakness, no admission of backsliding. The Jew in America 
illustrates the ideology of his religion by his loyalty to the 
national ideals, or what passes under the general term of patri- 
otism. He is the better Jew because of the effectiveness of his 
citizenship which he is able to manifest by obeying his religious 
teachings since Jewish ethics stress the ideals of American 
democracy. 

In his essay on “The Philosophy of Jewish History,’® S. M. 
Dubnow shows that Jewish history has suffered no interruption 
during thirty-five hundred years. In the first chapter of its 
existence, the Jewish religion is created, as Geiger explained. 

Obviously Jewish history begins with the biblical period. 
Here is recorded the emergence of a Semitic tribe from the 
barbarous background of crass, superstitious, nature-worshipping 
folk with rites common to all Semites.® But the spiritual indi- 
vidualism exhibited by the Jews of later generations is in part 
manifested early in their career. This emanation of sel{-deter- 
mination in terms of love is their distinct individuality and 
contribution to humanity. 


There is no intention of tracing the divine afflatus of Israel, 
whereby these crude tribesmen who figure in the early chapters 
of Genesis become the forerunners of idealists who introduced 
the God-idea of universal application and upheld a concept of 
social righteousness which is the foundation of the social order 
today. But this is the miracle of Israel. The God whom they 
worshipped in crudest guise became in time more than a national 
deity. He is the God of all mankind, Creator and Preserver of 
the world. Even the laws of morality exacted by the God of 
Israel are obligatory upon all mankind. Their observance spells 


*“Jewish History,” by S. M. Dubnow, p. 12, sqq. 
° Kinship and Marriage among the Arabs, by Robertson Smith. 


54 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


salvation and blessing to all who lay hold thereon. (Deut. 7:7-8, 
xlix: 1-6). 

The ideal upheld by the Bible consists in a recognition of 
God and its logical corollary or application, a life of rectitude. 
Coupled with this is the vision of a time when all nations will 
be filled with the knowledge of God and all mankind actuated 
by motives of brotherly kindness.’° The fulfillment of this con- 
summation is the messianic era. In that day brotherhood will 
be more prevalent and good will among men will cover the 
earth as the waters cover the depth of the sea. 

But until the realization of that messianic state, Israel is called 
or “chosen” as the ensign to the nations, and sponsor of this" 
ideal.1 Bearing aloft this banner inscribed with God’s purposes, 
he is destined to mingle among peoples the world over. In the 
course of ages the whole of humanity will become transformed. 
Israel is therefore, by right of his priestly appointment, a mis- 
sionary among the nations. He has a cause to serve and a 
philosophy of history. 

These lofty teachings were inculcated ere Judah met its doom 
at the hands of Babylon. But the ponderous hands of this 
mighty empire could not destroy him. The rod of Babylon 
punished. It also chastened Judah. Judah emerged purified and 
reformed for a new life, when as martyr, stoic, thinker, the Jew 
began the other phase of his career which has not yet been 
exhausted or completed. 

All this happened before 476 B. C. It marks the conclusion of 
the Biblical era and makes way for the Talmudic period. 


This period attained full sway about 135 C. E. At that time 
the tragic ending of the Bar Cocheba rebellion destroyed the 
hope for the restoration of the Second Commonwealth of Israel 
and established instead a kingdom of the spirit, whose throne 
is the Torah, an invisible empire of Ideals and Ideas. It is the 
beginning of the second great’® era of Jewish development and 
is an outgrowth of the Bible. 

The Talmudic period provides a basis for future expansion. — 


10 Tsaiah, Chapter 6. 

4 Tsaiah, 60:1-3. 

“% Thus begins that era known as the Diaspora, or exile, or “Golath” (in 
Hebrew), which according to the Jewish Nationalists has not ended nor 
will it, until the scattered remnant of the house of Jacob are foregathered 
in their ancient patrimony, Palestine. 


MAIN TRAVELLED ROADS OF JUDAISM 55 


The phase of Judaism must not be regarded as merely an era 
when the volumes of the Talmud were composed. Strictly 
speaking, the Talmudic era represents a spiritual attitude or a 
discipline enjoining on the Jew unalloyed obedience to the word 
of God revealed at Sinai. The commandments given at that 
time were expanded by the pressure of contracts within the 
national domain and beyond. These laws were the means of 
control set up when the political authority vested in the nation 
was destroyed by the Roman legions. The seat of authority 
was transferred to the moral laws, which guarded the Jews’ 
every step. 

These religious provisions of the Talmud aimed to unify the 
behavior of the Jews and enabled one to distinguish a brother 
in faith throughout the vast area of the diaspora by the similarity 
of practices and social customs. Despite the vast extent of the 
Jewish diaspora, the brotherhood of Israel was knit together by 
bonds no less tenacious because they were invisible. The code 
that regulated their conduct was embodied in the Talmud. 

This spiritual dictatorship which arose after the downfall of 
the Second Commonwealth was formulated in the Mishna, and 
represents the legislative activity of Rabbi Jochanan ben Zakkai, 
Jehuda Hannasi, Hillel and Shammai and their followers. The 
binding authority of these laws is obtained from the Pentateuch. 
All laws in the Mishna had to be derived, whether by logic or 
by forced interpretation, from Scripture, and were the second 
or oral law of the revealed law given on Sinai. 

As an illustration of the susceptibility of the Jew to his 
environment, the Talmudic era is a complete phenomenon. It 
shows how the Jews, robbed of their political home, created a 
spiritual domain for themselves. Through the instrumentality 
of innumerable religious rules set forth in the Talmud, the Jews 
were moulded into a corporate body. Scattered far and wide, 
individual fragments cleaved to their common heritage, and thus 
made Jewish people a religious group held together by a common 
heritage of hopes, memories, ambitions and visions. 

With this equipment the Jews were prepared to withstand 
the rigors of their disenfranchisement, or “exile,” as they styled 
it. But in America the authority of these rabbinical regulations 
is denied.1* The law of America is law. According to Talmudic 


#® The Pittsburgh Platform, Central Conference of Am. Rabbis, 1885. 


56 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


legislation the common law of America, as of every country 
where the Jews reside, is binding. But this is beside the point. 
What is at issue is the example of how Talmudic Judaism 
responded to an historical process, and in the course of centuries 
evolved an American Judaism. 

There have been other phases of Judaism evolved by the 
historical process, as previously stated. Talmudic Judaism, 
however, has been the most influential. It prevailed for a thou- 
sand years and still holds sway over the largest portion of Jewry. 
It provides the background from which American Judaism 
emerged. Hence its importance and significance in a study of 
the origin of this latest phase of the Jewish spirit. 

This compilation of the Talmud was completed at the begin- 
ning of the sixth century. At that time Babylon was still the 
intellectual center of Jewry. The law governing conduct, as 
well as the word of God, went forth from this new Zion, Babylon 
to the Jews in all known lands. Thus the Babylonian Talmud 
was elevated by the Jews to a position of importance second 
only to the Bible.* 

About the tenth century two events gave another turn to 
Jewish development. One was the appearance of Islam and the 
other the rise of Karaism. 

The religion of Islam, a daughter religion of Israel, stirred the 
slumbering East and gave to the devotees of Mohammed an 
unconquerable thirst for action and a lust for conquest. The 
followers of Allah engaged in a succession of religious wars 
resulting in consequences affecting the status of the Jew. For 
example, the Jews were no longer surrounded by heathens but 


14Tt is a mystery history possibly will never be able to explain that no 
mention or reference in Rabbinical literature, so far as one is able to detect 
with any degree of certainty is made of Jesus. References to a heretical sect, 
the Minim, are found in Talmud Berakot, for example. Whether these 
Minim are Christians there is no assurance, and yet Jesus was a contem- 
porary of many illustrious rabbis, Hillel for instance, and Paul mentions 
by name Gamaliel. The early Christian church was being organized in 
this period of Talmud compilation. Christianity is a direct offshoot, or 
daughter religion of Judaism. The ethical message of Jesus is rabbinical 
in source, intent, and application. Jesus the modern Jews look upon as 
a human teacher (Judaism, Christianity and the Modern Social Ideals, by 
George Fox). While Christianity is a product of the synagog and in 
early period the “Jew-Christian” was a Jewish sect the daughter religion 
did not affect the Jews. That was left for the Christians. They made 
themselves felt in blood and iron, in murder, rapine and plunder. The rise 
of Mohammed is of more importance. 


MAIN TRAVELLED ROADS OF JUDAISM 57 


by Mohammedans, who believed in a God fashioned in the image 
of the biblical conception of late periods, and who accorded the 
Jews the deference due them as the “People of the Book.’* 

The influence of Arabic culture appeared with the Jews, 
following the tendency among the Mohammedans to split up 
into religio-philosophic sects, gave birth to an anti-rabbinical 
sect, namely, the Karaites. The followers of this sect represent 
a new departure from rabbinical Judaism, as American Judaism 
is from the legalistic rabbinism of traditional orthodoxy. 

The Karaites launch a protest against the Talmud as the regu- 
lator of life and thought. They urge instead a return to the bibli- 
cal laws in their unadulterated simplicity. The adherents of this 
sect applied themselves to the rational study of the Bible, which 
had come to be the object of casuistic interpretation and legen- 
dary adornment among the Talmudists. By the cultivation of 
grammar and lexicography as applied to the Bible, they revived 
the Hebrew language which had been supplanted by the Aramaic. 
By the same means they precipitated discussions among the 
Talmudists and their own school on subjects of religious and 
philosophic interest. 

Aiter the tenth century the center of gravity in Jewry shifts 
from Asia Minor to Western Europe. The immigrants of those 
days carried with them westward the same intellectual curiosity 
and philosophic activity which they had displayed in the cradle 
lands of the East, and brought the Jews in direct contact with 
Islam—a contact that was vastly more important for them intel- 
lectually than their unhappy association with the followers of 
the “lowly” Nazarene. 

Judaism is the mother of Christianity and the religion of Islam. 
This is one of the commonplaces of history, but less is made 
of the contact of Israel with Mohammedanism than of that with 
the followers of the Nazarene. And yet the stream of Jewish 
life has washed the shores of many countries. It has been the 
fate of Israel to mingle with peoples of a strange tongue and so 
Jew and Arab have also met, and as an outcome of their 
encountering, the religion of a large part of the human race pays 
tribute to the ethical ideals embodied in the Ancient Hebrew 
Scripture. 

Mohammedanism is figuring in the newspapers in recent years 


*% This phrase is attributed to Mohammed. 


58 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


with greater frequency than ever. The prospects of direct con- 
tact with Islam has made some timid people apprehensive lest 
a new faith be injected into western countries that would jeopar- 
dize, they frantically proclaim, the foundations of civilization. 
This religion has been a mighty influence in Israel and it 
behooves one to examine the contact of Israel with Islam. 

Mohammedanism does not spell ruin of social order nor invite 
the downfall of humanity. In fact, the religion of Islam has been 
regarded by the leading spirits of Judaism to be charged with 
the historical mission of working with Jews and Christians in 
building up the Messianic Kingdom, and thus making straight 
the path for the ultimate triumph of the belief in one God in 
the hearts and souls of all men and nations. This is a view 
entertained by Jehuda ha Levi, for example, in his Cusari. An 
opinion of like tenor was corroborated by many enlightened 
rabbis of later eras. Both Christians and Mohammedans believe 
in God and His revelation to man, and in the unity of the human 
race. The knowledge of God has been spread all over the world 
as a result of a sacred literature that is based on the Bible of 
the Jews. The commandments, as these are worded in the 
Decalog, form the basis of the ethical laws for the largest portion 
of mankind. The influence radiating from the central spiritual 
source of these two world religions emanated from Judaism. 
The Jew, therefore, entertains no serious misgivings regarding 
the religion of Islam in the modern world. 


Islam owes its origin to Mohammed, who was an Arab camel- 
driver of Mecca in his early years, but one who became possessed 
with an idea of saving his country-men. It is said he was devoid 
of learning, but came under the obsession that he was sum- 
moned by Allah, the God of Abraham, to wage war against the 
idolatry of his Arabian kinsmen and restore in its place the pure 
faith of Allah. In Mecca, where he first announced his revela- 
tion against the fetishes of stock and stone assembled there for 
worship, he was hooted and persecuted. Finally, in desperation, 
he fled to Medina in the year 622, the year of the Hegira, a year 
sacred in Mohammedan theology as the Birth of Christ is among 
the Christians. His doctrine began gradually to find favor, 
particularly since he was a prophet who was a new-comer among 
them and all prophets are given a hearing in a new place. They 
are without honor only in their own home town. 


MAIN TRAVELLED ROADS OF JUDAISM 59 


Mohammed had at first offered the Jews to whom he 
sought refuge, inducements to recognize him as the last of the 
prophets, the last link in the chain of that remarkable group of 
men who had come forth from Zion. He had promised to adopt 
some of their religious practices, but the Jews refused to accept 
certain gross and sensual features of his preachment. Incensed 
at their refusal, Mohammed showed himself a true son of the 
Bedouins by revenging himself on the Jews with fanatical zeal. 

From the sources of information we have of the life and revela- 
tion of Mohammed, one is safe in saying that the origin of the 
belief in Allah, the God of Abraham, can be traced to an early 
period when Jewish tribes settled in the south of Arabia. Among 
these Jews were traders, goldsmiths, warriors, and knights 
endowed with a gift of song. Poetry was cultivated among them, 
and there was a certain Jewish poetess who wrote one of the 
earliest Arabic poems extant, an evidence of the advanced state 
of their culture in that early era. 


Obsessed with hallucinations regarding the divine origin of 
his mission, Mohammed set forth. This belief in Allah possessed 
his fiery soul with all the ardor of his intensely passionate nature. 
In these visions he received sublime conceptions of the one God 
and His creation; of the world’s Judge and Allah’s future Day 
of Judgment. These theological aspects were in part familiar 
to the Jews who had in fact evolved certain like concepts. These 
beliefs made him effective in his preaching against the idolatry 
practiced by his country-men, their cruelty and uncontrollable 
lust and appetites. 


Mohammed began his career as a preacher of repentance, 
following in this devotion the model of the great prophets of 
Israel who intruded on the riotous dwellers of the city with a 
proclamation of repentance: “Wash you! make you clean! put 
away the evil of your ways!” Threatening drastic consequences 
of the last Judgment, Mohammed tried to force the idolatrous 
Arabs to return to Allah in true contrition. But few of his 
townsmen in Mecca believed in his mfssion. The leading men 
of the city of Mecca derived a large income from the sales of 
“ecclesiastical goods” in connection with the service of the local 
sanctuary, and opposed him with fierce and violent measures, 
just as a certain family in Jerusalem, at the beginning of the 
common era, alleged to have held the monopoly of the doves 


60 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


required in the sacrifices of the temple of that day, is said to 
have opposed the fiery, denunciatory speeches of the Galilean 
carpenter. 

The opposition enkindled against Mohammed in Mecca forced 
him to flee to Medina, and he sought refuge in a Jewish colony, 
as intimated. He had hoped to obtain recognition from the Jews, 
especially after he had made certain concessions, such as the 
turning the face towards Jerusalem in prayer and keeping the 
Day of Atonement on the tenth of Tishri. In addition, he empha- 
sized the Unity of God, which forbade any encroachment upon 
this belief by the interception of a mediator in the guise of a 
“Son of God.” 

Liberally as Mohammed had borrowed from his Jewish asso- 
ciates, they could not be induced to recognize this uncouth, 
illiterate son of the desert as a prophet after the order of an 
Isaiah, a Jeremiah, or an Ezekiel. 

Again the great refusal of the Jew—as in the beginning of 
Christianity they were alleged to have refused the divine sonship 
of Jesus—occasioned Mohammed to turn his feigned friendship 
into deadly hatred and relentless revenge. His whole nature 
underwent a great change. His former enthusiasm and prophet 
zeal, it is said, were replaced by calculation and worldly desires. 
He who was the preacher of repentance at Mecca, who called 
upon his Arabian brethren to forego some of their lusty blood- 
thirsty ways, became himself a lover of blood-shed, robbery, 
and lust. Instead of Jerusalem, as he had promised, he chose 
Mecca, where of old had been located the idolatrous sanctuary 
of his religion, 

The power of this son of Ishmael is difficult to grasp. For 
within seven years he had gained a following of sufficient number 
to win the Arabian tribes to his divine revelation. Full of 
energy, these tribes stepped out of the desert to conquer the 
world. But unlike Israel of old, these swarthy sons of the desert 
bore the faith of the One God to the world by the sword. They 
too, like Israel, confined their divine revelation within a holy 
book, but sought to impose it on their subjects by the brandishing 
of the sword. 

Sword in hand, Mohammed and his followers conquered the 
Christian lands of the East, then the northern coast of Africa, 
and finally unfurled the green flag of Islam over the lands 


MAIN TRAVELLED ROADS OF JUDAISM 61 


of the west, in an effort to free the peoples of these countries 
from the thrall of a fanatical church. Within a century, the 
followers of the crescent had penetrated as far west as Gibraltar 
and invaded Spain, where they remained until the capture of 
Granada, when the last Moorish stronghold in Spain fell in 1492. 
That year commemorates epochal events: the discovery of the 
western continent by Columbus, who, some modern historians 
claim, was a Maranno; and the expulsion of the Jews from the 
Iberian peninsula. 


Islam, as Mohammedanism is often styled, is a religion that 
demands blind submission to the will of God. Whatever happens, 
it is the will of Allah. That is the final and ultimate edict of 
the Moslem. A doctrine of this character paralyzes the sense 
of freedom and is responsible for their deference to fatalism. 
Whatever is to be, will betide men whether they weep or laugh, 
is their conviction. Hence fanaticism, which treats every other 
religion with contempt, has crept into the faith of the Mussul- 
man. Their religion has remained national in outlook and never 
attained that broad outlook on the whole human race which 
reflects from the orations of the prophets of Israel. 


The afterworld, which figures very little in Biblical literature 
—although greatly amplified in the apocryphal and rabbinical 
writings—is a glorified paradise reserved for the faithful. Yet 
the Day of Judgment, which plays an important part in Moham- 
medan theology, is without any trace of divine mercy, in glaring 
contrast to Judaism, where God is often called Father of Mercy. 

These doctrines, briefly mentioned, indicate in part that the 
religion of Islam fostered the intellectual side of humanity, in 
contrast to the church, which placed unqualified emphasis on 
the emotional phase of the human being. Islam relied on reason 
and not on intuition for corroborations of belief. As a result, 
the cultivation of philosophy and science was encouraged in the 
mosque, whereas it was either banished or contemptuously 
neglected by the church. Damascus and Bagdad became centers 
of learning, of philosophic study and scientific investigation, 
uniting Nestorian (Unitarian), Jew, and Mohammedan in spread- 
ing general enlightenment. Greek science and philosophy, which 
the church had put under the ban, were revived by Mohammedan 
rulers, and additional studies made in them. Judaism felt the 
fructifying power of this revival and made possible the trans- 


62 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


lations into Syrian, Arabic, and Hebrew the scientific treatises 
of the ancient Greeks and their immediate followers. 


It is due to the contacts of the Jews with Arabic Moham- 
medans in Mesopotamia that the Jews began to understand the 
language of the Arabs. Their sciences and philosophic studies 
were influenced by them.*® The center of gravity, however, was 
shifting from Babylon to the west, and naturally it is in Europe, 
particularly Spain, where the greatest achievements of the Jews 
in the Middle Ages were consummated. 

This Spanish period of contact on the part of Jew and Arab 
has often been called the Golden Age of Hebrew letters. The 
list of writers who rose to immortality, scores upon scores— 
Dunach ben Labrath, Bachya, Solomon Gabirol,* Jehuda Halevi, 
Maimonides, Nachmanides, Moses and Abraham Ibn Ezra, to 
mention a few illustrious names. These poets, philosophers, 
physicians who experienced this spiritual flowering, lived in a 
condition of political well-being. Life in the “Juderias,” as the 
Spanish Ghettoes were called, was not wholly a bed of roses, 
but the circumstances attending the daily existence of the Jew- 
ish residents was a vast improvement over the reign of terror 
that prevailed under the Visigothic dynasty which the Moorish 
invaders overthrew in 711. Under their Christian masters the 
Jews had suffered untold cruelties. All mediaeval disabilities, 
such as segregation in certain quarters, had their origin under 
the Visigoths. The overthrow of the Visigothic oppressors at 
the hands of the Moslem in 711 was viewed not unnaturally as 
the signal for enfranchisement of Israel. 


Under the new Arab regime, all Jewish disabilities that had 
been imposed by the Visigothic dynasty were swept aside. A 
new political status was established, and the Jews found them- 
selves living amid fellow-monotheists whose language resembled 
the idiom of the synagog, and who were racially (in remote 
antiquity) fellow-Semites. Their Visigothic oppressors were a 
rude, ignorant rabble, compared to the learned and cultured 
Moor who brought with him into Spain luxuries of adornment 
and conveniences of living. He reared mansions exquisitely 
tiled, well-ventilated, and warmed by tubes of caked earth and 


* Life and Works of Saadia Gaon, by H. Malter, p. 137, sqq. 
“English Translation with Text of Religious Poems, issued by Jewish 
Publication Society of America, 1923. 


MAIN TRAVELLED ROADS OF JUDAISM 63 


cooled by fountains of running water. In brief, while Europe 
weltered in the Dark Ages, these Moslem invaders brought 
with them science and philosophy, architecture, mathematics, 
and the refinements of life. 

In the word, “algebra” we have still preserved a testimonial 
of the Arab’s venture in mathematics. “Alkali” and “Alembic” 
are chemical terms derived from Arabic influence, and it was 
Arabs who brought our present numerals from Hindustan. 
Astronomy originated in Babylonia, where they had ardently 
studied it for centuries, as they did geography. 


The Spanish Jews were the beneficiaries of these cultural con- 
tributions, and avidly assimilated these sciences. In the Spanish 
cities of Granada and Toledo, dwelt many Jewish families. Other 
Spanish towns were thick with Jews who came under the influ- 
ence of the learning and tolerant spirit of the new-comer. The 
Jewish intelligentsia was largely absorbed in interpreting the 
science and philosophy of the conqueror. The Jews were the 
main translators into Latin of many Arabic philosophers and 
scientists. 

The introduction of Arabic culture into Spain from whence 
it was distributed to other countries, was one of the turning 
points of European history—a real Renaissance—accepting the 
word in its truest sense. It is of interest, and at the same time 
of great importance that the Jews should have been one of the 
mediums of spreading the science and philosophy of Greece 
throughout the continent, chiefly in the monasteries, where learn- 
ing was often meagerly pursued but not wholly ignored, as it 
was in the comfortless stone castles of the barons. Through 
Maimonides, the conceptions of Aristotle were presented to the 
thinkers of his period, while to Ibn Gabirol it fell to revive 
Platonism among the scholastics of the thirteenth cetury.*® 

Vital as the spiritual activity of the Spanish Jews, we may 
readily imagine that they played no small part in those vast 
material activities of the Moors. While Spain was conquered 
by them in turn the Moors covered the country with palaces, 
hospitals, and aqueducts. It was the Moor who, in conjunction 
with the Jew, mined the copper, planted sugar cane, and built 
factories for manufacturing paper, silk, cotton and reworking 
the leather imported from Morocco. 


*% Opus cit. 


64 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


This prosperous era did not long endure. Gradually the Moors 
were defeated, and with each foot of soil rewon the policy 
towards the Jews altered. In 1481 the Inquisition was estab- 
lished and 2,000 Jews in Andalusia alone, were burned. In 1492, 
Granada, the last Arabic fortress, fell, and in the same year the 
Jews were expelled from Spain. The day of Arabic culture was 
over and the cross was again restored. 


The eleventh and twelfth centuries marked the heights of intel- 
lectual attainment of mediaeval Judaism, as has been shown. It 
was a veritable renaissance, signalizing the rebirth of science 
and philosophy. The pollenization of Arabic with Jewish culture 
gave birth to poetry, philosophy, science. As in the fifth century 
the union of Judaic with Hellenic culture’® brought in its train 
a number of new ideas in Alexandria, Egypt, so here in Anda- 
lusia, and so later in America, a similar situation brought similar 
consequences. 


A new viewpoint and attitude resulted from this amalgamation 
of Jewish with Arabic culture. The Jewish people dropped their 
misanthropy. Their inclination to retire within their own shells 
was arrested for a while, but revived again in the latter part of 
the 18th and 19th centuries. All careers were at that time open 
to them, as in America today. Side by side with their influential 
statesmen stood their Jewish poets. The study of medicine, 
physics, mathematics, astronomy, went hand in hand with the 
study of the Talmud and the Bible. 


This period is luminous with the glow of great personalities 
among the Spanish Jews. But of special interest is the model 
that Spanish Judaism affords the Jews of America. During the 
five centuries of Spanish Jewish culture, a distinct phase of 
Judaism was evolved reflecting the freedom and tolerance of 
Arabic civilization. But in 1492 bigotry and ecclesiastical 
tyranny drove the Jews from Spain, and in 1496 from Portugal. 
After experiencing an effervescence of the spirit the Jew was 
again compelled to grasp the staff of the wanderer and enter 
countries unknown and decidedly unfriendly. 

The expulsion of the Jews from Spanish domains under the 
fanatical control of the church scattered the martyr people over 
Europe. In each country they inhabited there was developed in 


#” Philo-Judaens of Alexandria and also Hellenism, by N. Bentwich. 


MAIN TRAVELLED ROADS OF JUDAISM 65 


course of time a phase of Judaism characteristic of the geo- 
graphical division in which they lived. 

In Holland, Germany, Austria, Turkey, Poland, where the 
Jews settled, a ceremonial or ritual of Judaism was developed 
peculiar to those countries. In Holland, a liberty-loving people 
created a tolerant government and enabled the Jews to prosper. 

Fortunate it was that Holland favored the cause of Israel. 
When the Netherlands shook off the control of Spain under 
Philip II, an era of culture and industry was inaugurated which 
the Jews, driven there by the scourge of the inquisitor, began 
to share. 

What Cordova had been for the Spanish Jews in the twelfth 
century, Amsterdam became for the Jews of the sixteenth. 
Freedom broke down the national exclusiveness of the Jews. 
Contact with his liberal neighbors enabled him to carry on his 
intellectual pursuits. An advanced state of culture was developed 
in Holland, not equak to Spanish culture, but continuing the 
splendid traditions of their former home. 

But in Germany and Austria, by very contrast, the economic 
circumstances of the Jews were appalling. The Protestant refor- 
mation might have illumined the minds of the people, but it 
did not soften their hearts towards the children of Israel. Luther 
harbored no kindness towards the Jews. The humanists of that 
period were powerless to allay the prejudices of the populace, 
still steeped in ignorance and foulest superstition. 

Unbearable conditions in Germany and Austria forced the 
Jews to emigrate in masses to Poland, where they were at that 
time offered the boon of a comparatively secure life. 

Poland had been a resort for Jewish immigrants from Ger- 
many since the outbreak of the Crusades. In the sixteenth 
century it rose to the position of a Jewish center. Asa national 
center of the Jews it contained both the necessary numerical 
strength and organization of social and industrial activities to 
foster a distinct Jewish life and morale, 

In this century Poland assumes the hegemony over the Jews 
of the world of that day. The ascendancy of Poland marks the 
displacement of the Sephardic, the Spanish-Portuguese element, 
and the supremacy of the Ashkenazic or German-Polish element. 

Being the entrepeneur or merchant class, the Polish Jews 
were legally protected. Numerous privileges were granted them. 


66 AMERICAN. JUDAISM 


Their peculiar circumstances in Poland left an impression on 
their inner life which called forth an intense mental activity. 
This activity, while German in origin, contained many original 
elements, particularly the formation of the, “Kahal.”?? Thus 
there is again projected on the screen of history another phase 
of Judaism, the Polish, where in a few centuries a distinct cul- 
tural group develops whose importance to America is incalcul- 
able, since the 20th century marks the ascendancy of this group 
in America. . 

It is said of this Polish-Jewish culture, by those competent to 
judge, that it enjoyed an inner autonomy similar in administra- 
tion to the authority exercised by the Geonim. This was due 
to the system of Talmudic academies scattered over the land, 
irom which graduated rabbis who were formed into guilds and 
endowed with a certain legislative power. Entrusted with sov- 
ereignty by the Polish authorities the rabbis exercised control 
over Israel. 

The organization of the Synods of the Four Countries, it is 
said, constituted the keystone of this intricate social and spiri- 
tual hierarchy. Thus rabbinism obtains fullest sway in Poland, 
breeding a new variant of Judaism, one which put secular knowl- 
edge and philosophy under the ban and isolated itself completely 
from its Christian environment.?2 

This exclusiveness had the virtue of its shortcoming. It gave 
a peculiar stability and completeness to the life of the Jew as 
an individual and as a member of society. By means of this 
isolation another phase of the religion of the Jew was evolved 
unlike that of his Spanish forebears, but none the less distinct, 
a positive reaction from environment on the one hand, and again 
a projection of its inner vitality and dynamic potentialities. The 
importance of this Polish-Jewish cult is its verification of the 
continuous unfolding of the Jewish spirit, which in the eighth, 
twelith and sixteenth centuries perfected new facets of its truth. 


That the rabbinism of Poland became arid and the fertile 
source of aberrations, such as Chassidism,?? and of Messianic 
extravagances, does not alter the fact that a distinct phase of 


*” Community organization. See Dubnow’s The Jews in Russia and 
Poland, Vol. I, p. 106, sqq. 

“Dubnow’s History of Russian-Polish Jews is authority for these 
statements. 

* Treated in detail in a later chapter. 


MAIN TRAVELLED ROADS OF JUDAISM 67 


Judaism was evolved there, a continuation of antecedent tradi- 
tions and of elaboration thereof; just as American Judaism linked 
with the past, is a conscious projection of inspiration towards 
the realization of a newer adjustment to the ideals of democracy, 
political and economic. 

From the sixteenth to the eighteenth®® centuries the night of 
Israel was darkest. Bloody persecutions were replaced by restric- 
tive laws to degrade the Jews, who were now hounded from pillar 
to post. But this very moment Europe realized the error of its 
ways and began to repent. The barrier reared against Israel 
and the outer world was too high and thick for the liberalizing 
forces at first to break through. But a breach was gradually 
made, and the Polish Jews, enveloped in mediaeval darkness, 
turned their faces towards the new light shining in the West 
instead of to the mythical glow of the traditional East. 


The period of enlightenment then dawning was the child of 
the French Revolution. Reason was resurrected in this period 
and liberal minds do not ask whether men are Jews or Christians, 
Sufficient for them is the fact that they are human beings. 


This period which opens a new era in Judaism focuses atten- 
tion on Germany, where dominant personalities “laid down a 
barrage” against superstition, ignorance and despotism. The 
spiritual and social regeneration which ensued among the Jews 
of Germany and later penetrated into benighted Russian Poland, 
in the guise of the Haskalah movement,* resulted in forming 
again a distinctly national phase of Judaism in Germany, namely, 
a German Judaism. But it must not be forgotten that in its 
absolute state there is no German as there is no American Juda- 
ism. Judaism is universal, and credit is due to the rabbis trained 
in Germany under the influence of that era, who announced this 
truth made known of old. But we are not treating absolutes. 
Our aim is to show that in each country where the Jew dwells 
a certain residuum of the spirit peculiar to that country is depos- 


The Reform Movement, by Philipson, p. 5. 

*“The Haskalah or ‘enlightenment’ indicates the beginning of a move- 
ment among the Jews about the end of the eighteenth century in Eastern 
Europe towards abandoning their exclusiveness and acquiring the knowl- 
edge, manners, and aspirations.of the nations among whom they dwelt. 
It is identified with the substitution of the study of modern subjects for . 
the study of the Talmud, with opposition to fanaticism, superstition and 
Chassidism; with the adoption by Jews of agriculture and handicrafts and 
with a desire to keep in touch with the times.” J. E., Vol. VI, p..256. 


68 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


ited thereby to change the complexion of Judaism in that par- 
ticular era. Following this precedent, the same historical unfold- 
ing is now operating in America. 

What is essential at this juncture is to note the historical 
parallel. This is reaffirmed in the case of the German Jews as 
it is in the Judeo-Hellenic and the Spanish-Arabic, namely, that 
the pliability of Judaism as to form and ritual permits the Jews 
of each geographic division to cloak the ceremonial and also 
renew the spiritual content of their religion with ingredients 
borrowed from the peoples among whom they enjoy fellowship 
and citizenship.*® 

Thus in this period of enlightenment the Jew was capable of 
responding to the rejuvenation of science, art and literature with 
remarkable swiftness. The bond of intolerance with which the 
Jew had fettered himself was easily broken. The appeals to 
reason and free thought abounding in this era merely re-echoed 
what he had announced in earlier generations. 

The transformation in the lives of the Jews of Germany was 
hastened by the French Revolution. The principles of liberty, 
equality and fraternity resulted in civil and religious emanci- 
pation. 

Among the enlightened Jews of that period, the magnet of 
affiliation was not religious but national. Jew and non-Jew 
abandoned the affiliation of faith and yielded to that of a uni- 
versal humanity or a German nationality. More and more, 
religious traditions were abandoned in favor of universal prin- 
ciples. Ceremonials that were incompatible with reason were 
rejected. For the first time in centuries the Jew felt himself 
to be a citizen of the country where he enjoyed life, liberty and 
prosperity. 

* “The hold of his national culture could not be as strong on the Jew 
in the dispersion as on the Jew in his own land. Hence, though the Jew- 
ish mind had not acquired that imitative skill and assimilative capacity 
which are characteristics of it today, the Alexandrian community felt the 
attraction of Hellenism more rapidly and more deeply than the Pales- 
tinian. They adopted the language of their environment, and endeavored 
to adjust their religious ideas and observances to the intellectual stand- 
point of the dominant culture. The translation of the Scripture into Greek 
was a vital step in the adjustment. A further step is marked by the 
abundant apologetic literature in which the Jewish Law is interpreted 
as a code of rational ethics and a deliberate attempt is made to adopt 


Greek theology to the support of Judaism.” Hellenism, by Bentwich, 
p. 336, sqq. 


MAIN TRAVELLED ROADS OF JUDAISM 69 


Adjusting himself to this enfranchisement required certain 
modifications in the ceremonial of home and synagog as well 
as a new orientation of Judaism. He would remain a loyal son 
of the synagog, but the tabernacle where he worshipped would 
change its setting. The universalistic element of Judaism, voiced 
in remote antiquity by the prophets of Israel, obtained a louder 
and clearer accentuation. The merely local rites and practices 
of a rabbinical interpretation of Judaism separated the Jew from 
the modern world. Judaism had to discard either the universal 
element or the temporary rabbinical legislation. There was 
hardly any choice. At all events, a choice was made by the 
Jews of Germany. They cleaved to the universal outlook of 
Judaism, as the prophets and poets of ancient Israel forevis- 
ioned it. 

This new construction of Jewish destiny in course of time 
received a label. It is now known as Reform Judaism. Owing 
to the number of German rabbis who emphasized the essentials 
of their religious heritage, Reform Judaism in the United States 
is regarded as a product of Germany, and is on that account 
under suspicion. To such narrowness let none yield. Judaism 
here is a logical development of the Jewish genius. Rabbinism, 
from which it is descended, is exhausted. It has outgrown its 
usefulness. To be modern and enjoy the blessings of liberty 
and civil rights, the Jew must exemplify the universal teachings 
of the Universal God whom his spiritual ancestors first conceived, 

At the beginning of the nineteenth century, even in the last 
decades of the eighteenth, this phase of Judaism, German when 
viewed from the angle of a national or a geographical division, 
universal from the vantage ground of history—took shape. It 
is the immediate ancestor of American Judaism. fi 

In the unfolding of the Jewish genius the Biblical, Talmudical, 
Geonic, Hellenic, Arabic, Spanish-Arabic, Russian-Polish, Ger- 
man phases are noted. There are other phases, namely, the 
Karaitic and Chassidic, as there is today nationalistic Judaism. 

Accepting the process of growth in history as a criterion, one 
is warranted in describing the characteristics of Judaism in 
America from the standpoint of American democracy. The 
Judaism come to consciousness here is a continuum of that reve- 
lation first acknowledged when the morning stars sang together. 


THE SETTLEMENT OF THE JEWS 
ON THE NEW CONTINENT 


In these days of rabid nationalism, when a spurious anthro- 
pology creates racial divisions where none exist, as in the case 
of the alleged “nordic races,” it is essential to trace the settle- 
ment of the Jews on this western continent, and to show that 
their tenure is long established and their fitness for citizenship 
sustained by temperament, experience, religious and social ideals. 
Yet even this guarantee is insufficient to satisfy the unbalanced 
superpatriots who announce a startling policy which they label 
“Americanism,” the purport of which is that only those profess- 
ing identical religious dogmas and are bred of the same fictitious 
racial division known as “nordics” are eligible for membership 
in that exclusive club formerly known as the United States. 
These privileged candidates were selected by Charles Houston 
Chamberlain, an Englishman, who became a naturalized German 
for their so-called superior qualities inherent as he claimed in 
them as in all Germanic peoples including the late Hun and 
other pagan foes of like racial lineage. None other are accept- 
able. The Jew who has been living on this continent as long 
as any other racial group and longer than the “nordics,” is 
not perturbed by this sudden splurge of fanaticism, ignorance 
and pseudo-science. He has been a victim of these bugaboos 
of the ignoramus for centuries. Nor is he disturbed by the sudden 
chilling ardor towards him and the rise of the skeptic who 
challenges his loyalty and patriotism. He has been as long a 
Russian as the hundred percenters among the Slavs and still 
while living in the domain of the Romanoffs longer than the 
former royal family, he was a prey to their unbridled savagery 
and murderous designs. It may be so here since he is accus- 
tomed to the trickery of the chauvanist who would oust him 
from this country where he has dwelt since its discovery. 


It is therefore not a new sensation for the Jew to be told that 
he is not one of the people among whom he lives. He has 
heard that slander in other lands and at other times. Then, as 

Esther, 3:8-12. 

70 


JEWS ON THE NEW CONTINENT fp. 


now, he denied it and remained to prove by his life that he was 
loyal to the national government, ready to serve it at all times 
and to spend his life and substance for its maintenance, as he 
did here from the days of Haym Salomon to Jacob Schiff. Here, 
as elsewhere, the Jew is sustained in his loyalty by the tenets 
and intents of his religion whose mission is social, the imper- 
sonation of ethical ideals not existing in nature but upsurging 
from the consciousness of the Jewish people and practically 
applied in daily conduct. The cause which the Jew serves is iden- 
tified with patriotism and loyalty to the national ideals of democ- 
racy, political and economic. It is a collective responsibility and 
the object of its solicitude is the welfare of the nation. Patriotism 
as the Jew conceives it is rooted in moral ideals. At heart poli- 
tics, ethics, economics, are one, and political democracy implies 
economic liberation or industrial democracy. If nations without 
visions perish it is equally true that nations without religion 
go the way of dusty death. The nation that denies the con- 
trolling force of religion as a means of direction towards 
service and balance, that is ethical conduct, is not destined 
long to endure. For religion inculcates the worth and worthi- 
ness of man, the love of man towards his fellow creatures and 
points to the Father of all men in whose image every human 
being is fashioned, as the Creator of all humanity. 


It is the religion of the Jewish people that is their chiefest 
heritage. From their religion radiate those influences that 
Americanize them, meaning by that term such behavior as 
inspires in the individual a due regard for other men in matters 
of faith and in the means and methods wherewith one maintains 
oneself. Economic democracy no less than political must be 
achieved so that one’s citizenship be an asset and one’s labors 
contribute to the common wealth. For this is the intent of 
democracy and so expresses the ambition of Judaism. Nowhere 
is democracy so fully realized and so copiously demonstrated 
as in these United States, and nowhere has Judaism made such 
splendid strides. Here after weary ages and many sojournings, 
the Jews pilgrimmed. In their veins flowed the ancient long- 
ings for liberty, fellowship and justice. Here they hoped to 
clasp hands with their fellow men and make firm the foundations 
of those ideals, so that this democracy conceived in a love of 
humanity might never perish from the earth. 


72 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


The settlement of the Jews in these United States is not merely 
a shift of fortune, but a historical sequence. It is in a large 
measure the fulfillment of prophecy, that prophecy being the 
establishment of democracy forevisioned by Israel as the ultimate 
goal, the Messianic age which is to crown the wrinkled brow of 
tortured humanity in the later days. Had there not been this 
close alignment of Jewish ideals with democratic intentions, the 
history of the Jews in the United States might have been read in 
other accents than those vocalizing it today. The Jew is inher- 
ently democratic. The United States appeals to him as a verifi- 
cation of his own vision. Having been tried by experience, tour- 
ing the whole world ’round, he has accumulated a fund of wis- 
dom. This is deposited in his consciousness, a golden residuum 
from which he draws his inspiration no less than his ethical 
behests in the larger field of endeavor opened for him by the 
founding of the Republic.? 

The value of Jewish history lodges in the record afforded us 
of the various states of Jewish consciousness of which the evolu- 
tion of the American Jew is but one among several. For from 
these depositories of ideals and experiences interlinked in the 
complexes of the Jewish people radiate those influences that 
direct the Jew on his path of life, here and elsewhere. This con- 
sciousness is the spiritual precipitate of the thoughts, hopes and 


* The espousal of the democratic ideals central in The Republic ante- 
dates the establishment of the Continental Congress. In his ‘The 
Hebrews in America”’—a book that is now out of date and perhaps inac- 
curate but at all events preserves a number of valuable historical items. 
Markens mentions several estimable “Hebrew” gentlemen who assisted 
financially the struggling republic. Haym Salomon gave generous and 
timely assistance to the founders of the Republic. “It was Haym Salo- 
mon who when the people of Philadelphia were deprived of the use of 
any circulating medium by the act of withdrawal of Continental money 
and great distress existed, caused $2,000 in specie to be distributed among 
the poor of that city.” More than this, Haym Salomon loaned the Revo- 
lutionary Congress high sums of money—for that period—. Says Mar- 
kens: ‘The list made and deposited at the Probate office of the certifi- 
cates of Revolutionary indebtedness, of which he was seized at the time 
of his death in 1784, shows upwards of $350,000, consisting of War office, 
Loan office, Commissioner, Treasury and Continental certificates, not one 
cent of which was ever received by the infant children owing to circum- 
stances for which they could not be accountable.” 

Isaac Moses is another Philadelphia merchant whose patriotism was 
marked by a contribution of $15,000 to the Revolutionary cause, which 
was not aided alone by these sinews of war but by the soldiery of Joseph 
Israel, Israel Israel. 


JEWS ON THE NEW CONTINENT .| 73 


ambitions of the Jewish people. Each generation replenishes 
this consciousness in obedience to the morale or discipline 
enforced on the Jewish people at that time. Judaism, the religion 
of the Jewish people, is therefore rooted in the Jewish people. 
Without Jewish people there can be no Judaism although Juda- 
ism is more than a religion and the Jewish people more than an 
ethnic group or race which is denied on good authority and is a 
theory not accepted in this book. The content of Judaism in what- 
ever period examined, proves to be a product of the interlocking 
processes of history. As there are various phases of Jewish 
history there are certain aspects of Judaism germane to those 
periods, such as the Talmudic, the Gaonic, Spanish-Arabic, mod- 
ern scientific, and American. 

It follows, then, that a survey of Judaism during any particular 
historical period, must have regard for the persons and personali- 
ties of the Jewish people of that era. This means that an Ameri- 
can Judaism is inconceivable without American Jews as witnesses 
to the genius of American democracy. To know the content of 
American Judaism exacts an account of the settlement of the 
Jews in the United States as a sine qua non. In other words, 
the next question that presents itself is the perfectly obvious 
one: Where do the Jews of America come from? 

In common with their fellow-citizens, American Jews trace 
their immediate ancestry to Europe. There are no original 
Americans in the United States except the Indians. The Jewish 
people are no more aliens here than the Yankees or the “blue 
bloods of Virginia” or the modern vociferous “hundred-per- 
centers,” all of whom are directly or remotely of alien ancestry. 
Those benighted patriots who are reviving a defunct “Know- 
nothing-ism” forget that all Americans foreswore their former 
nationalities and allegiancies when they set sail for these shores. 
The Jews differed in no wise from their fellow-citizens; they 
too became Americans, new products of this new land. 

It must be borne in mind that the Jews scattered among the 
nations of the world do not derive their Judaism from profession 
or confession, Judaism is imposed on the Jew by reason of his 
Jewish birth. He belongs to the Jewish people who have been 
consecrated to a distinct religious duty. The nature of this his- 
torical obligation is manifested in the discharge of civic and 


74 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


national duties.2 There is no clash and conflict between Ameri- 
canism and Judaism. Ina large and liberal sense the religion of 
Judaism is expressed in our service to American democracy. The 
American Jew is therefore part and portion of no other country 
save America. It is an inversion of Jewish destiny to regard him 
in any other political relationship. 

The political identity of the American Jew is with America 
since he chances to live here, and here, as everywhere, his religion 
is the means or milieu at his command to manifest his national 
affiliation. This is his peculiar birthright among Jewish people 
and the Jewish people have proved that a people are more than 
a nation. In speaking of the Jews in this wise the word is used 
in the sense of a “people” who are bound together to the end that 
all humanity may ‘know God,’* that is, a religious people. 

The particular contribution that each segment of Jewish set- 
tlers brings to this country is spiritual. Intangible as that is, 
from the realm of the spirit are culled those ingredients that 
evolved what is vaguely labelled American Judaism. No revela- 
tion of Judaism is final, and from our present expression of Juda- 
ism a different pronouncement is destined to be proclaimed. 
Revelation among the Jews is continuous, and daily are new 
chapters written for the endless Torah of the Jews.5 An Ameri- 
can Judaism is merely an attitude of an eternal manifestation of 
the unfolding of the spirit of God in man. In his world-encom- 
passing mission, the Jew is bestriding this American continent 
destined for the distant goals of ethical perfection. He cannot 
tarry in complacent satisfaction. His duty neither slumbers 
nor sleeps. He is tempted however to pause amid the years and 
summarize the articles of his proclamation. The main concern 
of the following paragraphs is.to inventory the various groups 
among the Jewish people in America in the light of their geogra- 
phical origin, merely as a convenient means of demarcation, the 
distinction or division among Jews being on the basis of inter- 
pretation and fullfillment of covenantal relations, rather than 
geography. 
~ *“We must so profit life’s opportunities as to impress Thy spirit upon 
things of earth within and without us and shape them to the higher uses 
the divinity which Thou hast breathed upon our mortal clay.” Olath 
Tamid. Eng. Translation, p. 38. 

“Jer. 31:31-34. 


5 Among the Chassidim, each one is to be his own Torah. (See Chapter 
Eight.) 


JEWS ON THE NEW CONTINENT 75 


The Jews are a fraction of God’s children. There are possibly 
some fifteen millions of them in all the world. In 1914 it was 
estimated that the Jews of America numbered 2,933,374. This 
figure was given by the American Jewish Year Book of 1919 after 
special efforts had been made to be accurate. Ten years later, 
it may be conjectured, the Jewish population in the United 
States will be in round numbers, 3,000,000. 

All statistics regarding the number of Jews in the United 
States are merely estimates. The earliest approximation ap- 
pears to have been made in 1818 by Mordecai M. Noah, who put 
the number at 3,000. The report of the U. S. Census Bureau for 
New York State in 1790, gives the number of Jews in New York 

City at the date as 385. Rabbi Gershon Mendez Seixas, the 
patriot Rabbi of the Revolution, said that the Jewish inhabitants 
of Gotham in 1812 numbered 400. 


That Jewish people lived in other colonial cities of the Revolu- 
tion and pre-Revolutionary period must not be overlooked, Phila- 
delphia, Lancaster, Pa., Baltimore, Newport, R. I., Charleston, 
Savannah. New York City had then and ever after the largest 
number of Jewish inhabitants. It is the largest Jewish city in 
the world. There are 1,600,000, nearly two million, Jewish souls 
in the Empire State—more than one-half the Jewish population 
of the entire United States.® 

The American Jews can lay claim to the chauvanistic boast, if 
they care to indulge in this childish pastime, that their tenure of 
residence in America is longer than that of any other group, 
since the first sailor to set foot on this western continent was 
Louis de Torres, the interpreter in the expedition of Columbus. 
Furthermore, the first child of European parents born on this 
continent was Jewish.’ 

Investigations described by Dr. M. Kayserling in his book, 
“Christopher Columbus and the Participation of the Jews in 
Spanish and Portuguese Discoveries” brought to light the fact 


®It is to the everlasting credit of New York Jews that the promise made 
Peter Stuyvesant that their brethren would never become a charge on the 
public has been kept inviolable for nearly three hundred years. When one 
recalls that into the port of New York drift the hapless victims of blood- 
lust, rapine and the vilest barbarities of Christian love, the heroic endeavor 
of New Yorkers to succor their impoverished brethren attests to the 
fidelity of their colonial oath and their fealty to honor. 

™This statement is open to doubt and has no other value save that of 
an item of news in an inaccurate table of statistics. 


76 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


that Jewish sailors accompanied Columbus on his epoch-making 
expedition which resulted in the discovery of the new world. 
And it was Jewish financiers who equipped his caravel and Jew- 
ish scientists who furnished his charts for navigation. These 
sailors were: Alfonso de la Calle, Rodrigo Sanchez and Bernal, 
the ship’s surgeon.® 


Venturesome as the Jews have ever been—note the bravery 
of Jewish peddlers in the age of chivalry°—traders and explorers 
in all the previous ages, they continued that role in the early cen- 
turies of America. There are reasons to believe that there were 
Jews in the crews of Drake and Raleigh. Not only has the Jew 
been a trader, introducing tobacco and sugar into Europe, for 
instance ;!® he has played an important part as an intellectual 
intermediary, as Joseph Jacobs shows in his “Jewish Contrib- 
utions to Civilization.” It is likely that certain bold spirits 
among the Jews of Europe sought these shores during the six- 
teenth century." 


But one is safe in conjecturing that there were unknown Jews 
on the American continent previous to the formation of the 
first settlement of organized Jews in America in 1624. The con- 
quest of Brazil, so to speak, by the Dutch in 1624 resulted in 
the organization of the first Jewish community. 


This was a settlement of Maranos from Amsterdam, for it was 
dangerous in those days to be a Jew and to be found out. When 
the Netherlands wrested their independence from the Spanish 
crown a new constitution was drawn up in Holland, based on 


* Detailed information on this subject is not pertinent at this juncture, 
but may be found in Kayserling’s book. 

*Scott’s “Ivanhoe.” 

* There is no longer any doubt that the Jews by their wide distribution 
throughout the countries of Europe were able to assist in the transfer of 
the colonial trade of the New World in sugar, indigo and most likely 
tobacco. “There is some evidence that the Jews introduced sugar planta- 
tions into St. Thomas, and even into Brazil; and when they were expelled 
from the latter in 1654, they transferred a good deal of their activity in 
this regard to Barbados, Jamaica and Martinique and San Domingo, 
largely increasing the sugar production of these islands. The sugar trade 
between the French West Indian islands and the mother country was con- 
centrated at Bordeaux.” Jewish Contributions to Civilization, by J. Jacobs, 
Di 223. 

“ American Jewish Historical Society instigated the composition of bro- 
chures on obscure and unrecorded pioneers of the pre-colonial and colonial 
periods. Many of these men were as valuable as explorers and opened up 
centers of trade. 


JEWS ON THE NEW CONTINENT 717 


religious tolerance and freedom. The fugitives who had fled 
the Spanish Inquisition, established in 1492 and continued with 
unabating fury for many years on the continent of Europe and 
also in Mexico, availed themselves of the favorable conditions 
prevailing in Holland. They were soon joined by fugitives from 
Portugal, whence the Jews were expelled in 1496, and from 
other countries. Thus it came to pass that in the seventeenth 
century Amsterdam was one of the leading Jewish communi- 
ties of the world. 

The countries in the New World under Dutch control reflected 
the policy of the mother country. So long as Brazil was under 
the control of Holland, the lot of the Jew in the country was 
secure. But in 1654 Holland lost Brazil and the Jews were 
forced to emigrate from that haven of refuge. Some settled in 
the Dutch and British possessions of Central and South America, 
such as Surinam, Curacao and Jamaica. But the most impor- 
tant settlement was made in New York in 1654, thirty-four 
years after the Mayflower landed the Pilgrim fathers at 
Plymouth, Mass. 

The formation of the West Indian Company of Amsterdam 
in 1638, the purpose of which was to open up trade with Brazil, 
appears to have served as an indirect invitation to a large num- 
ber of Jewish refugees from Spain and Portugal to emigrate to 
the new continent. As many as 600, it is reported, took ship in 
the autumn of 1642. Measured by this figure, the number of 
Jewish pioneers in Brazil and the Dutch possessions of the 
southern continent must have been considerable. In no colonial 
possession of the Netherlands were the Jews subjected to indig- 
nities similar to those experienced in other European countries. 
The religious tolerance extended by Holland to her subjects was 
not confined to the Netherlands, but included her colonies as 
well. 

In the Spanish domains, on the contrary, the fanaticism and 
ecclesiastical fury that drove the Jews forth under the lash of 
persecution in 1492 and later was visited upon the Jews settled 
there. In the City of Mexico and in Lima, the Jews were bap- 
tized in their own blood. Historians inform us that the celebra- 
tion of the Passover in the City of Mexico in 1654 was the 
occasion for an auto-do-fe in which eighty unfortunate Jews died 
at the stake amid festive music, the jangling of church bells 
and the wild acclaim of the mob. The colonists learned this 


78 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


lesson of barbarism from the mother country that had taught 
them bull fighting, cockfighting and murdering Jews. The lot of 
the Jews in Spanish domains of South America was precarious. 
At the first opportunity the immigrants departed from the insuf- 
ferable environment and many centuries elapsed before Jews set 
foot on the southern continent again. 

As a result of the inhospitable policies pursued by the Span- 
ish colonies, no Jewish culture has been developed in South 
America, nor has that continent witnessed the establishment of 
large permanent settlements nor enjoyed the prosperity of the 
northern continent. Whether or not this circumstance is mys- 
teriously. connected with the treatment of the Jews settles no 
issue.* There is, however, a curious parallel evidenced in the 
fate that overtook the mother country, Spain, and her colonies. 
After the expulsion of the Jews, Spain began to languish, and 
so likewise from similar causes did her American colonies. 

In recent years an effort was made on the part of Jewish 
agencies of the United States, such as the Union of American 
Hebrew Congregations and the B’nai Brith, to visit Mexico in 
behalf of the scattered remnants of Jacob located in that rest- 
less but alluring country and reunite them to their brothers of 
the covenant. This was done because it was felt that no efforts 
would be made nor organized by the Jews who chanced to live 
there, nor in other settlements of Central America, unless their 
brethren from the northern continent should seek out these 
lost sheep of the house of Israel and link them with the tradi- 
tional communal activities always maintained by the Jewish 
people.'* 

Within recent decades, however, emigration to South America 
has been resumed. Stimulated by concessions tendered the ven- 


% The settlement of the Jews in South America is not increasing per- 
ceptibly in modern times. There are Jews in Brazil and Argentine, in 
Central America and other parts of that gigantic continent, but they are 
a fragment of the general population. 

*In the “Story of the Nations” Series, the decline of Spain is attrib- 
uted to the expulsion of the Jews. 

Special mention should be made at this juncture of the splendid and 
in many instances yeoman service rendered by Rabbi Martin Zielonka of 
El Paso who has for years, under the auspices of District No. 7 I. O. 
B. B., interested himself and his brethren in the Jews of Mexico. Some 
Mexican Jews are former residents of this country. The largest propor- 
tion emigrated directly from Europe. Movements are under way there 
to establish a synagog and maintain such social agencies as characterize 
communal life among Jewish people at all times and places. 


JEWS ON THE NEW CONTINENT 79 


turesome, funds were bequeathed by the late Baron de Hirsch 
for the settlement of Jews in the Argentine. These settlements 
in the Argentine, although liberally subsidized, have not been 
prosperous, nor has the presence of Jewish settlers been accep- 
table to the fanatical priests who dominate the hidalgos along 
the pampas of the La Plata. Immigrating originally as farm- 
ers, many of these settlers later drifted into Buenos Aires which 
now contains a considerable Jewish settlement.*° 


Brazil, too, is now beckoning to the homeless of all nations to 
dwell in her vast domains, which are larger than the United 
States. The friendly relations between the Jewish People of the 
United States and South America, long anticipated, may materi- 
alize now as a result of commerce instituted by Jewish mer- 
chants and the desire of South American Jews to affiliate with 
their brethren here. 


It is idle to speculate on what might have been the course of 
the events in the New World, had tolerance swayed the rulers 
of this El Dorado. Had the Maranos, the Jewish refugees of 
the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, been able to shake off the 
dust of fanatical persecution when they landed on the rockbound 
coast of South America; had the thunder of the Andes and the 
outstretching plains beneath the Southern Cross vibrated with 
liberty as well as hope, the story of South American civilization 
might be chaptered with items of as epochal significance as that 
of the Jews of the United States. 


Present day South American Jewry is negligible. A settle- 
ment of Jews fringes the west coast. Occasionally our Jewish 


% Colonization among the Jews has often been tried, but never proven 
successful. Jews are neither adverse to farming—there are increasing 
numbers settling on farms in Russia as well as in this country—nor hard 
labor. Witness the Herculean efforts put forth by the colonists in mod- 
ern Palestine. Their tireless exertions and the hardest manual labor 
proves that given a high incentive, Jews will break new soil in untilled 
areas. Subsidized colonists are rendered impotent by receiving something 
for nothing. The Jews are no exception to this rule. Wherever deported 
to build up new sections of unsettled countries, they have invariably 
drifted back to their former haunts, no matter how impoverished and over- 
populated they find their way as undesirable aliens in large cities. The 
Jews who voluntarily return to the soil stay put. Those imposed on the 
soil are like chaff which the wind driveth away. There has therefore 
been less inclination lately to grubstake Jewish colonists than formerly, 
although there is a well organized and admirably conducted American 
Agricultural Aid Society which has made many Jewish farmers self- 
supporting. 


80 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


press carries a story about the “Jews in Central and South 
America,” but these accounts are episodes of the flotsam and 
jetsam in the stream of Jewish tradition, similar to those isolated 
fragments of ancient Spanish Jews, descendants of the Maranos, 
who are despised by the present populace, and are virtually out- 
casts. They are neither Spanish nor Moorish, Jewish nor 
Christian. Had not Vicente Blasco Ibanez in his “Luna Ben 
Amor” introduced them to the international reading public, these 
unhappy people would have been forgotten as a tale that is 
told.*® 

By irony, so grim that it must provoke the laughter of God, 
Spain is now inviting her banished Jews to return and populate 
the waste places of her domain. Madrid, Toledo, Cordova, cities 
that in the Spanish-Arabic period, were centers of Jewish cul- 
ture (Madrid excepted), each contains today a small Jewish 
population. South America, subtly imbibing the elixir of human- 
itarianism, invites the Jews flogged from Poland, whither 
they had fled when exiled from Spain, to migrate there; to build 
houses and dwell therein; to plant gardens in a new world of 
opportunity and assured toleration.%7 

The restoration, however, of the Portuguese power in the 
seventeenth century in Brazil, led to the removal of many of the 
recently-settled Maranos from that country. In 1654 a party of 
twenty-seven men, women and children, some say twenty-three, 
set sail from the port of Bahia, Brazil, on board the barque St. 
Catherina, from New Amsterdam. They had followed in the 
wake of Jacob Barsimson and Jacob Aboab, alleged to be the 
first Jews to reach that port, although it is possible that individ- 
ual Jews had strayed into the country before this date. 


The arrival of this small group of pilgrims was not attended 
with the eclat of a triumphal entry. In the first place their bag- 
gage was seized and sold at public auction in payment of their 
ship passage. Then again their arrival excited the wrath of Peter 
Stuyvesant, colonial governor, who notified his government of 
the presence of this colony of Jews, and suggested that “none 
of the Jewish nation be permitted to infest New Netherlands.” 


“The American Pro-Falasha Committee are endeavoring by their efforts 
the educational and religious rehabilitation of the Falasha Jews of Abys- 
sinia, who were in recent years “discovered” by Jacques Faitlovitch. 

“The largest manufacturers of rubber goods in Brazil are a Jewish 
firm, 1923, Schayah Brothers. 


JEWS ON THE NEW CONTINENT 81 


His opposition was not sustained by Holland. The testy gov- 
ernor was informed that the proposed exclusion from New 
Amsterdam was “inconsistent with reason and justice” and an 
act was passed permitting the Jews to reside and trade in New 
Netherlands as long as they did not allow one of their own to 
become a charge on the community. 

This pledge made over 250 years ago, New York Jewry has 
never knowingly broken. Noblesse oblige has no better illus- 
tration than the obligation assumed by the Jews of New York 
and the unselfish devotion wherewith it has been discharged. 
Not only New York City but all American Jewry has accepted 
the responsibility of their brethren, who have been overtaken by 
adversity. Thus the entrance of the Jews into the New World 
was attended by a vow of fidelity towards their brethren which 
has made the Jews the country over mindful of their obligations 
toward one another, and, as will be shown, resulted in fostering 
institutions of a religious, educational and cultural nature. The 
American Jews have been guarding their brethren of the 
covenant on all their ways unto this very hour.** 

As early as 1733 there had been an effort to settle Jews in 
what is now the State of Georgia. Some Portuguese Jews 
availed themselves of the opportunity created by James Ogle- 
thorpe who made Georgia an asylum for convicts willing to 
reform. The governor of the colony fearing that the presence of 
Jews would jeopardize the success of the colony, discouraged 
the settlement of Jews there. Many of these moved to South 
Carolina (for which John Locke, the philosopher, had framed a 
constitution) which declared equal rights for all inhabitants of 
the State. A congregation was subsequently formed in 1750 at 
Charleston and for many decades this Jewish settlement was 
the most flourishing in the territory now comprised by the 
United States. 

At the end of the eighteenth century there were only six com- 
munities in which there were known Jewish inhabitants. These 
were New York, as the city was called after it passed into the 
hands of the English in 1644, Newport, Rhode Island; Savannah, 
Ga.; Charleston, S. C.; Philadelphia and Lancaster, Pa. 

The settlers in those cities were either directly or indirectly 

%8Tn a report on War Relief for the devastated countries and peoples of 


Europe, the Jews of America contributed (ending 1923) a total of 
$50,000,000. 


82 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


descendants of the Spanish and Portuguese exiles. It is there- 
fore important to bear in mind that the settlement of Jews in 
America was initiated by Sephardic Jews. Among those most 
conspicuous in New Amsterdam were Asher Levy, an out- 
standing personality to whom his fellow-Jews then and there- 
after are indebted for civil rights. Some of his contemporary 
fellow-Jews were Abram De Cucena, David Israel, Moses Am- 
brasias, Abram de La Simon, Salvator D’Andada, Joseph De 
Cista, David Fiera, Jacob Menrique, Isaac Mesa and Isaac 
Levy. 

These settlers came from South America, as has been 
explained, and were of Spanish and Portuguese antecedents. 
But, singular as it may appear, these Jewish pioneers have not 
shaped the destiny of American Judaism as the Pilgrim Fathers, 
who in 1624 anchored off the barren coast of New England— 
refugees also from intolerance as cruel as that which the Jews 
suffered. Seeking these shores to obtain increased devotion to 
that principle for self-determination and self-expression which 
is the inalienable asset of the Anglo-Saxon group as it is of the 
Jewish, they have stamped America with the impress of their 
political aspirations and religious fervor. 


The powerful influences of American Judaism were not hewn 
from the rock of Sephardic Jewry. In yielding to them, the 
right of seniority of settlement a full measure of merit is 
bestowed on them. The influence that shaped Judaism in 
America was obtained from another group which followed 
shortly thereafter to these shores, namely the “Ashkenasic,” 
that is, the Jews living in German-speaking countries, also 
Russia, Poland and colonies or dependencies of those countries. 

Within a century from the date the Jews landed in New 
Amsterdam, the complexion of immigration had changed. Inces- 
sant warfare in Europe combined with discrimination and 
mediaeval persecution, particularly trade restrictions and exclu- 
sion from guilds, continued to harass the Jews and made their 
lot miserable. It has been said that the sixteenth and seven- 
teenth centuries’ were the darkest in Jewry, virtually their 
mediaeval age, although a period of absolute sterility and 
benightment such as overwhelmed Europe never occurred in 
Jewish circles. But it was in this period of deepest misery 


* The Reform Movement, by D. Philipson, p. 5. 


JEWS ON THE NEW CONTINENT 83 


for European Jews that the first bold spirits obtained passage 
and sailed to the New World. 

In the records that appear after 1740, when the passage of 
an English law gave the Jews of the American colonies full 
rights of naturalization, there may be noticed on the roster 
of membership in the congregations of Mickve Israel of Phila- 
delphia and in the hamlets of Pennsylvania, names of men 
whose birth places were Alsace, the Palatinate, Rheinish Prussia, 
Prussia and the newly acquired territory of the former Polish 
Empire. Joseph Simon, for instance, arrived in Lancaster in 
1740; Meyer Hart, who was one of the founders of Easton, 
came there in 1747 and Aaron Levy arrived in Northumberland 
County in 1760.2° These men hailed from German-speaking 
countries. The Jewish population of the colonies grew slowly. 
At the time of the Revolutionary War, the number of Jews 
in the thirteen original colonies did not exceed two thousand. 

The rapid increase of immigration from the continent of 
Europe began in 1830. Reactionary governments in Europe, 
the aftermath of the Napoleonic wars and of the July Revolu- 
tion of 1830, when the prospects of improvements in the lot 
of the Jews either economically or politically, were dissipated, 
were the causes of extensive immigration to America. 


From the days of the American Revolution, until the promul- 
gation of the heinous Russian May Laws of 1880, the tide of 
Jewish immigration was predominantly German. During this 
century America became more settled and before the century 
had run its course, a great Civil War had been fought, which 
merged the dissenting elements into a union, one and insepar- 
able, for all time. Jewish communities were now established 
and synagogs built. There was now the semblance of a Jewish 
morale and the organization of Jewish activities on a national 
instead of a local scale. The hinterland was opening. Settlers 
were crossing the Appalachian range. To all of these new 
towns and outposts of the Mississippi Valley came Jewish 
pioneers. 


After the Revolutionary War, and especially after the war of 
1812, in both of which there had been Jewish soldiers and 


” There are today in Eastern Pennsylvania many Protestant families 
bearing names such as Jacobs, Isaacs, Cohens, Leiser, Schnurman, etc., 
whose ancestors were Jewish pioneers who, as peddlers, penetrated the 
hinterland of that pre-Revolutionary period, and married and settled there. 


84 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


officers, immigration began to cross the Appalachian range in 
large groups. It is believed that previous to 1818 no Jews were 
included in the population of towns in what was at that period 
the frontier. To towns like Cincinnati, Jews came about 1820. 
In that year, a certain P. I. Johnson, an English Jew” arrived. 
Later he moved to Louisville and then to St. Louis. 

Among the earliest settlers in Cleveland, Ohio, was Samson 
Thorman of Unsleben, Bavaria. He was followed by Aaron 
Lowentrite, Schonigen, Bavaria. These men were intrepid 
youths, who, leaving their fathers’ homes and the land of their 
nativity, followed the light of the empire which westward took 
its course, and became peddlers in this new realm. The first 
Jewish family to locate in Cleveland, it is said, was that of 
Samson Hoffman, who also came from Unsleben.??, During the 
same year, Simon Thorman of Unsleben joined his kin, in the 
new land. Soon thereafter came Simon Newark from Wilmers- 
dorf, near Fuerth, Bavaria; Moses Alsbacher from Unsleben, 
S. L. Coleman and Gerson Strauss, also Bavarian Jews. An 
organization, known as the Israelite Society, was started by 
them in 1839. A burial ground was purchased in 1840. In this 
wise, religious activities of national importance were begun. 

In Chicago, also, a band of Bavarian Jews settled. This group 
had planned to found an agricultural colony in Illinois in 1841. 
The experiment proved impractical and those who had come to 
till the soil moved to what was then an insignificant town on the 
shores of Lake Michigan to save themselves from famine. 

Among these pioneers were Jacob Fuller and Benedict Shu- 
bert, who engaged in business. They were soon followed by 
Abraham Kohn, the same Kohn who sent an American flag 
of his own manufacture to Abraham Lincoln before his depar- 
ture for Washington to assume the presidency. Other settlers 
were Levi Rosenfelt, Jacob Rosenberg, Isaac Teigler, Meyer 
Klein, Rubel Brothers, M. M. Gerstley, Henry Greenebaum and 
others, all of whom were of German birth. 

21 Cincinnati’s Temple B’nai Jeshurun, said Dr. Philipson, at the hun- 
dredth anniversary of its founding, “was organized by a band of English 
ews. 

: “Much of this information on the early history of Jewish settlement in 
this continent has been obtained from Isaac Markens’ “The Hebrews in 
America,” published by the author, 1888. It is likely that the meticulous 
will find fault with dates and names. This volume does not essay orig- 


inal research on this score. For more detailed information consult the 
monographs of the American Jewish Historical Society. 


JEWS ON THE NEW CONTINENT 85 


In 1816, four years previous to the admission of Missouri 
into the Union as a state, the territory was inhabited by a 
Jewish family, the Blocks, consisting of several brothers and 
numerous cousins, all of them natives of Schwiham, Bohemia. 
They first settled at Cape Girardeau, Mo., and later some of 
them moved to St. Louis which was becoming a particularly 
prosperous settlement. Steamers from New Orleans were now 
landing there. In 1821, its population of 5,000, all told, included 
Eliezer Block, an attorney, a member of the distinguished Block 
family, all of whom were respected as industrious, high-minded 
successful business men. 


The pioneers of the prosperous and influential Jewish com- 
munity of Pittsburg, Pa., were David Strasburger, Emanuel 
Reis, Jacob Klein, Louis Stern, William Frank, L. Herch- 
feld, Simon Stein, N. Gallinger and E. Wromer, all of whom 
came from Germany to settle in the New World. 


The most prominent among the early settlers of Mobile, 
Alabama, were B. L. Tim, who came from Hamburg, Ger- 
many; I. Goldsmith, a Bavarian; S. Lyons and D. Markstein, 
from Prussia, and A. Goldstucker, from Bavaria. The Jewish 
settlement of Mobile is typical of many other southern cities, 
such as Memphis, Tenn.; Galveston, Texas; and Atlanta and 
Augusta, Ga., which developed from trading posts and gulf 
ports into important commercial centers.** 


The year 1837 witnessed the arrival of the first Jewish set- 


28 After the Civil War the settlement of Jews in Southern States was a 
phase of the extending frontier which affected the entire nation. In those 
days it was indeed a new country, particularly that portion of it west of 
the Mississippi. The Atlantic seaboard and gulf states were sadly deso- 
lated by the war, and the open country to the west was without roads, 
towns, means of communication or transportation, save by saddle horse 
or boat. The Jewish peddlers who penetrated into this section were often 
advance guards of civilization. The vast majority were of German par- 
entage and sought these shores to obtain a larger increase of economic 
liberation, liberty, and self-determination. With a pack on their back, 
they plunged into immeasurable forests, waded streams, detoured about 
miasmic swamps, enduring hunger and thirst, suffering from the intense 
heat and the bite and sting of tormenting insects. The trading posts 
where these peddlers came have become cities, as is true of all small 
towns that existed then. In several of these Jewish merchants settled, 
joining with their fellow-citizens in building up commercial and industrial 
organizations of importance. 


86 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


tlers in Albany, New York. That city is now memorable in 
Jewish annals, as the community where Rabbi Isaac M. Wise, 
located as rabbi of Congregation Bethel in 1846. The con- 
gregation had been organized by the thirty or more families 
of Bavarian Jews who were then living there. 

Their number included Mayor Rice, Simeon Schwartz, Bern- 
hard Schmidt, Louis Sporburg, Julius Gerson, Mayer Isaac, 
Anshel Lind, Lemuel Linderstein and Morris Herrman. 

Previous to the year 1840 there were no Jews in Rochester, 
N. Y., a city which now contains a Jewish population of 
approximately 20,000. During the early forties, Jewish ped- 
dlers penetrated into the wilderness as the endless forests of 
that region appeared to the Europeans. Among them was my 
grandfather, Lesser Leiser, who landed in New York in 1843 
and with a pack on his back gradually trekked westward till 
he reached Rochester, where he tarried a while, and then 
returned to Europe. 

In 1848 congregation Berith Kodesh was organized. On the 
roster of this congregation were Joseph Wile, Gabriel Wile, 
Joseph Katz, Samuel Marks, Henry Levi, Jacob Altman, Joseph 
Altman, A. Adler, Elias Wolf, A. Weinberg and J. Gans, all of 
whom were German Jews. 


The growing city of Buffalo, N. Y., attracted Jewish emi- 
grants as early as 1835, when a certain Mr. Flersheim, a 
teacher of the German language and a native of Frankfort on the 
Main, settled there. The colonists increased rapidly and in 
1847 there were sufficient Jews in that city to organize con- 
gregation Beth El. Among the members were Solomon Phil- 
lips, Elias Bernheim, Joseph E. Strauss, Mark Moritz, Samuel 
Altman and Michael Noah, a Noah who was a relative of 
Mordecai Manuel Noah, playwright and philanthropist who 
made an unsuccessful attempt to establish a Jewish State on 
Grand Island in Niagara River. With the exception of Mr. 
Noah, who was an Englishman, all the early settlers of Buffalo 
were German. 

It is needless to detail the settlement of other cities such as 
New Haven, Conn., whose early Jewish settlers were also 
Bavarians. One is constrained to mention the most important 
cities of the Middle West if not the entire country, but the 
composition of Jewish inhabitants in all our American cities 


JEWS ON THE NEW CONTINENT 87 


is substantially alike, a fact which is particularly true of the 
centers populated previous to the Civil War.** 

If all other evidence failed, an examination of the congre- 
gational roster would convince the future historian that Jews 
of German-speaking countries constituted the second wave 
of Jewish immigrants who sought out this new realm of 
opportunity and freedom. Additional evidence is afforded the 
historian in the prayer books compiled for the congregations 
organized in this period. The “Olath Tamid” of David Ein- 
horn was published originally in German. This ritual, an 
epitome of the aspirations and beliefs of modern Judaism was 
antedated by Merzbacker’s, Jastrow’s and Wise’s, all of whom 
had German originals in mind. But no hard and fast lines 
can be drawn on this score. There was, of course, an admix- 
ture of Jews hailing from other countries, besides Germany, 
a condition always prevailing in the Diaspora, although their 
number was negligible. 

These German Jews were gradually penetrating into all sec- 
tions of the United States. Cities were far apart in those days. 
Such widely separated localities as Mobile and Detroit were 
settled predominantly by Jews of German extraction. And this 
is particularly true of all cities along the Atlantic seaboard 
and in the Middle West. This statement applies to the Jewish 
census previous to and immediately following the Civil War. 
It is natural that the sea coast cities should have been the 
first to increase by accession of emigrants from Germany and 
Austria. Poverty on the one hand and restrictions of com- 
merce and industry on the other, prevented the Jews of those 
countries from fulfilling the law of life which they are enjoined 
to obey as the sine qua non of their religion. Setting sail for 
America, their worldly means enabled them to reach only Castle 
Garden. They had no other possessions than the garments on 
their bodies, no other treasure than a deathless hope in their 
souls. 

The importance of this German immigration will become 
* The Jew, as Patriot and Soldier, by Simon Wolf, lists the names of 
Jewish soldiers so far as these can be ascertained, engaged in the Civil 
War. My own father landed at Castle Garden, July 4, 1863. He pre- 
sented himself that same day to a recruiting officer, and was told that no 
more soldiers were needed by the Union Army, since their victory at 


Gettysburg would soon end the war. The American Jewish soldier’s per- 
centage in the World War was larger than that of any other group. 


88 AMERICAN JUDAISM 

evident when an analysis of the spiritual heritage of these 
settlers is made. But it must not be concluded that the Jewish 
people of the United States were restricted to Spanish and 
Portuguese settlers of the pre-Revolutionary period or to Ger- 
man Jews thereafter. For Jews from German-speaking coun- 
tries were not the only group who came here during the 
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. 

Jews from other geographical areas of Europe and Asia 
gained access to this country during that time and later. Early 
in American history these few individuals who had been scat- 
tered and isolated so as to become lost or obscure in some 
instances, were later reinforced by a third wave of immigration, 
the largest that has reached these shores and one that still 
continues despite the national immigration restrictions of the 
present time. 

This third segment of immigration comes from Eastern 
Europe. The increasing disabilities of the Russian Jews in 
the Czaristic period and especially the barbaric May Laws of 
1882, when the Russian Government gradually succeeded in 
consolidating all anti-Jewish immigration to the United States. 
Proceeding at first at a slow pace, it increased in volume. At 
its height it became a passive but effective protest against that 
new Egyptian oppression of the Jews, then held in bondage 
by a brutal Czarism. i 

During the first three years of the eighties, an increasing 
number of Russian Jews entered the port of New York. In 
1881 there were 8,193 immigrants; in 1882, 17,497, in 1883, 
6,907. In the following three years, from 1884 to 1886, the 
movement remained practically on the same level, counting 
15,000 to 17,000 immigrants annually.2> In the last three 
years of that decade it again gained considerably in volume, 
mounting in 1887 to 28,944, in 1888 to 31,256 and 1889 to 
31,889. 

The exodus from Russia was undoubtedly stimulated by 
the law imposing a fine for evading military service and by 
the introduction of an educational percentage restriction. Mili- 
tary fines of the kind referred to ruined many families. The 
disproportion between rights and duties in Russian Jewry was 
disheartening. Denied the right of residence and the privi- 


25 History of the Jews in Russia and Poland, by S. M. Dubnow, Vol. fp 
Diasate 


JEWS ON THE NEW CONTINENT 89 


leges of a school education, the Jews were forced to serve in 
the army under conditions that approached barbarism, What 
more natural course for a self-respecting youth than to hazard 
his fortune in a country where he could receive full civil 
equality and free schooling without any compulsory military 
service? 

The first years during which these immigrants resided in 
America, they encountered a severe struggle for existence.” 
Among them were many intellectuals who had given up their 
careers in Russia and dreamed of becoming farmers. With the 
aid of charitable organizations, a number of qolonies were 
formed and farms established in various parts of the United 
States.27 After a few years of vain struggle against material 
want and lack of adaptation to local conditions, many of these 
colonies and farms were abandoned. Later, however, the 
founding of the National Farm School of- Doylestown, Pa., 
to prepare American Youth, Jewish and non-Jewish, for agri- 
culture, made such ventures less hazardous, 

Gradually the idealistic spirit of these Russian pioneers gave 
way to a sober realism more in harmony with American con- 
ditions. The bulk of the immigrant masses settled in the cities, 
principally New York. They worked in factories or at trades, 
the most important of which was the needle trade. They 
engaged in peddling and in farming, and lastly in the liberal 
professions. Many an immigrant passed successively through 
all these economic stages before obtaining a secure economic 
position. 

The result of these wanderings and vicissitudes: was a well- 
established Jewry in the various communities of the United 
States, which totalled, at the beginning of the twentieth cen- 
tury some 200,000 souls. The German Jews, who had previous 
to that date been in the majority, began to notice that they 
were outnumbered by the recent arrivals. The third great 
accession of Jews to America, who came from Eastern Europe, 
outnumbered the previous settlers of German ancestry. 

There are at present continual additions of Sephardic Jews 
{from Salonica and Turkey. These are few in number, although 
sufficient to support synagogs and maintain a newspaper 
published in their peculiar Spaniolish dialect. These recent 


* Capitalized by Jewish novelists as the background of their fiction. 
* The Jewish farmer in the United States is increasing. 


90 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


Sephardic Jews are more numerous than their Sephardic pre- 
decessors of the seventeenth century, but they are not suff- 
ciently acclimated to cast any spiritual shadows on American 
Judaism. They keep the even tenor of their way, content to 
earn their living and read their parochial paper. 

The American Jews are compounded of three groups: the 
Sephardic, German and Russian-Polish. Each group is iden- 
tified with a particular geographical division and naturally 
reflect the varied environments of their different locales. Envir- 
onment has not obliterated the traces of their common heredity. 
The common consciousness of Jewish kinship tended to blend 
them into one religious group, albeit there were social strati- 
fications among the three groups when they chanced to be 
brought into closer contact. The proud, often arrogant Seph- 
ardic, did not condescend to mingle with what he regarded as 
an inferior German Jew. Inter-marriage among the Sephardic 
and German Jew was looked upon in somewhat the same light 
as if a Jewish boy now elopes with a Gentile girl, or vice- 
versa. Later German Jews sneered at Russian-Polish immi- 
grants and treated them with scorn. These animosities are 
gradually evaporating under the sunnier influences of tolerance, 
and in response to the generous appeal of the United States 
for likemindedness among its various citizens. There is less 
inclination to draw lines of distinction within the Jewish group, 
or segment the various layers of Jews into their original ele- 
ments. As the Jews resent references to the qualifying desig- 
nation of their religion, so a like description of each one’s 
peculiar affiliation to the house of Israel is less frequently 
stressed today than heretofore. That one is a conservative or 
reform, Russian or German Jew is of less moment now than 
formerly. Petty differences are obliterated. Lines of demarca- 
tion are blotted out, in order that the various groups may unite 
their spiritual forces to the making of American Jews. This 
is the ultimate achievement. Russia was in its day peopled 
by various groups who in course of ages became one compact 
group, save for the Karaitic element in the Crimea, and so 
Germany. These national groups were compounded of different 
segments who, in course of time, became unified. What hap- 
pened to Jews in Germany and Russia in former ages is destined 
to occur here: the various Jewish groups are rapidly merging 
into an American-Jewish type. The American Jew has even 


JEWS ON THE NEW CONTINENT 91 


now a construction of religion that is his own, and Dr. M. 
Fishberg in his book, “The Jews,” says they have an American 
type. It is our purpose to give this Americanism a local habi- 
tation and a name so far as it involves the Jewish people living 
in the United States, although Canada”* is included. 


* There are many Jews in Canada. Many came originally from Europe— 
some in later years from the U. S. Canadian Jews follow largely the 
religious, social and economic policies of their neighbors, but in religious 
matters are less progressive. 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN 
JUDAISM 


Naturally the settlement of the Jews on this continent has a 
priority claim over the religious preoccupations of the sons of 
Jacob. In the foregoing chapters the historical record of that 
settlement on the part of the sires of the present generation of 
American Israel was briefly sketched. The tribulations and 
uncertainties of the sojourn, the anguish and often penury 
attending adjustment—the finding one’s self in the storm and 
stress of life—which was the lot of our fathers, now yields to 
another pilgrimage, one equally hazardous, the pilgrimage into 
the realms of the spirit. The adjustment incident to the settle- 
ment of our fathers of the flesh in this country was paralleled 
on the plane of the spirit. Here, too, they had to find themselves 
and build tabernacles, as they had established their places of 
business, their factories, mills, foundries, mines and plantations. 

The present chapter is also an exploration. Its purpose is 
to examine the foundation of American Judaism, testing the 
rafters and beams (which are doctrine and principle) that 
hold the structure together. The elements utilized to erect 
that edifice not built by human hands are many: ritual, tradi- 
tion, ceremony, philosophy, anthropology, literature, history— 
all are the depository of Jewish aspiration and ideals for service 
at the altar of humanity. These various ingredients are com- 
pounded in that spiritual substance labelled Judaism. And 
yet this phenomenon is not merely a religion. It is an expres- 
sion of the religious consciousness of a people who have incar- 
nated and corporealized a conception of life and living in terms 
of humanity, and assumed these obligations entailed in such 
an attitude towards God, man and the world. No matter what 
construction is placed on Judaism, whether one illustrates it as 
an expression of personal opinion or the accepted interpreta- 
tion of a group, one’s Judaism will always be based on one’s 
treatment of humanity. What we do for our townsmen and our 
fellow-citizens embodies our application of Judaism. 

There is a radical departure from this construction of Juda- 
ism, as has been intimated in the Introduction. The differen- 


92 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 93 


tiation is based on this conception of service, Best ratane 
espouse America as an act of worship, a function of their 
religion. The nationalists and other groups previously described 
do not consider the purpose of Judaism to be in part a series 
of civic duties. To most of the groups who are out of sym- 
pathy with American Judaism, whatever their religion implies, 
it is a stimulation obtained from reciting the traditional ritual 
or discharging a ceremonial as an exercise of emotion and after 
the habit of aesthetics, proffers its own compensation. 

Let it be borne in mind that while the designations, “reform,” 
“orthodox,” “liberal,” “historical,” “prophetic,” which are in 
vogue among us today, sound ominous and discriminatory, yet 
through all these phases and aspects of Judaism, here and else- 
where, there flows a broad stream. By no token, real or imagin- 
ary, can American Judaism be regarded as unique, sui generis, or 
so estranged from the age-long House of Jacob as to be unre- 
lated to it. On the contrary, Reform Jews are the youngest 
member of the family, merely kin to all who were ushered into 
life before them. The attitude of the Jewish people of this 
country concurring in that interpretation of their Judaism which 
has been branded as Reform, represent merely the present status 
of Jewish consciousness among them today. In current scien- 
tific phraseology American Judaism exhibits the evolution 
of Judaism today. It is not a finality. It is not even perfect 
nor the last reaction of truth, for that matter, in the realm of 
things Jewish. American Jews can only describe and name 
the boundaries of their present religious territory. This con- 
cession to mortality and the natural limitations of knowledge 
invested in each generation accords well with the notion attrib- 
uted to the rabbis who said of Noah, regarded in Scripture 
as “righteous in his generation” that in another generation he 
might not have been righteous. The values of one generation 
do not serve as standards of measurement in another age. 
Noah might have been an Elisha Ben Abuyah or some other 
scapegoat of a later period. Reform Judaism, the result of 
historical circumstances and sequences, may make way for 
another order as it in turn departed from previous formulas. 

The three groups that settled in America, Sephardic, Ger- 
man, East-European, each brought with them a certain ritual 


*A Talmudic character alleged to have been an apostate—most likely a 
liberal. independent thinker. 


94 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


and religious concept common to all: that was legalism. This 
interpretation of the Jewish religion enjoined on all Jews the 
duty of performing certain ceremonials, observing regular holi- 
days and festivals and fulfilling the elaborate ritual connected 
with their observance and that of the all-controlling Sabbath. 
Religion was not to them so much a matter of doctrine as it 
was faithful conformity to rules of behavior. To obey literally 
or to discharge by means of subterfuges ‘a series of ordinances 
classified in codes which were drawn up-at various times, 
expressed the totality of religion to them. These codes might 
have been the “Mishna Torah” of Maimonides, compiled in the 
Twelfth Century, or, in most likelihood, as was the case of our 
immediate ancestors, the “Shulchan Aruk” of Joseph Caro, 
made in the Sixteenth Century. These digests covered every 
exigency of life and derived their authority from the Penta- 
teuch in the first place, and from elaborations thereof in the 
Mishna. This was the second law that was invented to explain 
and expound the law of Moses given on Sinai. From the law 
revealed at Sinai, all later rabbinical codes were evolved. By 
means of this, the entire scheme of existence of the Jewish 
people was regimented. Fidelity to these laws sanctified one’s 
life. In the doing of them the Jew glorified God and all that is 
implied in that comprehensive poetic term. He also obtained a 
great reward: clean hands and a pure heart. 

Fidelity in the fulfillment of these minute and encompassing 
statutes also conditioned another consummation: the restora- 
tion of Palestine. In the conception of rabbinical Judaism, the 
restoration of Palestine is dependent on the performance of these 
commandments. When it comes to pass that everywhere God 
will be acknowledged One, and His name One, then it will be 
made possible for Israel to return.? While it was confidently 
expected that some day this final consummation would be real- 
ized, there was no disguising the belief that its dawning was 
remote, but feasible and likely. This concept forms an import- 
ant item of doctrine. American Jews no longer await a distinct 
fulfillment of this vision as the special dispensation of provi- 
dence. To them the distribution of the Jews the world over 
is providential, enabling all humanity to take hold of the hem 


*Singer Prayer Bk., p. 59. 


*Prayer for the Anniversary of the Destruction of Jerusalem, Olath 
Tamid, Eng. Trans., p. 141, sqq. 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 9% 


of their garment, saying, “Come let us go with you for we have 
heard that God is with you.” 

There is a temptation to digress at this juncture and antici- 
pate the succession of events that led to the organization of 
American Judaism. It has been made evident that there is a 
continuous progression in the Jewish religion. In sketching 
these ideas and conceptions entered today, deference need be 
paid the pioneers whose orientation was eastward. The first 
settlers were strict conformists and literalists. 

This is particularly true of the Sephardic Jews who first 
inhabited this land. The religious authority under which they 
were controlled, and by means of which they regulated their 
lives, was the Talmud and such redactions as were made 
therefrom in later periods, especially the code known as the 
“Shulchan Aruk,” to which reference has already been made. 
This code furnished them a norm, whereby they adjudicated 
their values and set up their attitudes. The intent of these 
codes was to control behavior in each and every Jew to this end: 
strict conformity to them resulted in hallowing life and thus 
made earth also holy. 

The method whereby this sanctification was attained is be- 
havioristic, the faithful following a routine. This regulation 
created a morale, and founded the “mores” of various communi- 
ties on a firm basis. The technical term for this process in the 
vernacular of this group is “minhag.” Each group set up a more 
or less elaborate “minhag,” the outcome of their behavioristic 
scheme of discharging the precepts of the Lord. Such regimen- 
tation, it is readily understood, admitted of no freedom nor in- 
dependence of action in our sense of that term. Action was par- 
ticularly prescribed in the realm of religion and religion and life 
were and still are synonymous. Deviation from the codes which 
were amplified and explained by various decisions or responses 
handed down by rabbis of great legalistic learning imperilled 
the social standing, in fact the very life of the Jew. These 
expert Talmudists fortified their position, technically their Hala- 
kah, by precedents taken from Scripture. Their course of action 
was dictated on grounds of that authority provided by the 
Mishna and rabbinical amplifications, all of which were regarded 
as an extension of the original Mosaic revelation, and in the 
light of that origin obeyed implicitly. 

This legalistic scheme in all its rigidity is the predecessor of 


96 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


Reform Judaism and the background from which it emerged. 
It was that aspect of religion that prevailed among the first 
Jewish settlers on this continent. To the more independently 
minded of this era, such a system of existence appears harsh, 
unrelenting, drab. But it was not so viewed by those who fol- 
lowed it unreservedly and faithfully. To them it was a delight. 
This legalism appears austere, but it was a bond of union. By 
means of it the early settlers here, as the Jews of Diaspora in 
general, were held together until the Nineteenth century, when 
a complete change in the ceremonial and the legalistic scheme 
of behavior was brought about. The transformation of the 
political status of the Jew from disenfranchisement to enfran- 
chisement, a status alas, that is now threatened, hastened their 
departure from their former legalistic methods. 

The new era, contemporaneous with the French Revolution, 
witnessed the admission of the Jew into full citizenship on an 
equality with his fellow-citizens of other faiths. In Germany, 
no less than France, Austria, Italy, England, the Jew of fact 
or fiction is no longer distinguished from his neighbor by his 
foreign language, manner of speech, his gabardine or any 
freakish apparel imposed on him by intolerance of church and 
state, such as the badge of shame he was charged to wear, or 
a peculiar conical shaped hat. Even his own ritual locks and 
ringlets and his long beard were shorn. He began to iron out 
the cringe in his soul as he had the bend in his knee. He dared 
to stand erect, clean shaven and in the latest style garment of 
the boulevard. He identified himself completely with the 
nation whose language he spoke, whose art and industry he 
shared, and with whom he struggled for a national life in 
terms of political equality. Educated as many of the Jews 
were in gymnasium and university, all those who had obtained 
the benefits of a higher or university education, began to share 
the political destiny of the peoples among whom they dwelt. 
Hence the hope voiced in the traditional liturgy for the 
restoration of Palestine,* for example, no longer expressed the 
views of Jewry; particularly the Jews of Germany. The entire 
system of ritualism drawn up by tradition became in conse- 
quence burdensome and incompatible with their business, and 
social status. Judaism had been divine legislation to a Moses 
Mendelsohn. Now it was discovered that this legislation, 


*Singer’s Standard Prayer Bk., p. 66, sqq. 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 9% 


whatever its origin, came in conflict with modern democracy 
by imposing an older legalism upon another and newer political 
legalism which had just been accepted by them. Later 
it was noted that Judaism was not divine legislation at all, but 
doctrine, divine doctrine, if one wishes, but doctrine® affecting 
the action of the Jewish people and guiding that action towards 
humane end. 

This particular conception came to consciousness among the 
Jews of Germany who are responsible for the doctrines that 
enter into the construction of American Judaism. The great 
changes in their modes of living and methods of education, the 
reorganization, in a word, of their social, political and economic 
status, compelled them to harmonize their religious practices 
with the conditions and situations arising from their emanci- 
pation in Germany at that time, namely, the last decade of the 
Eighteenth and the early Nineteenth Centuries. 

Under the stress of this need for adjustment felt on the part 
of a few Jewish people of Germany for the modern situations 
projected at that time, the Reform Movement was engendered. 
The first concerted effort to effect a reform in the ceremonial 
of the synagog, and later in the doctrines of the Jewish religion 
(within our own age since Judaism is always incurring 
changes) transpired in Germany. This is no reflection on 
other countries of Europe. Now it came to pass that in the 
early decades of the nineteenth century, a few German rabbis 
and Jewish scholars encouraged and abetted by a few, but a 
very few, congregations, lent themselves to the task of mod- 
ernizing their religious heritage so as to permit larger con- 
tacts with their countrymen—for this is what the process 
implies—can not detain us now. It was not accidental, but the 
logical sequence of historical happenings and events prevalent 
in this period of enlightenment. The Jewish people were not 
the only group in the state who began to enjoy emancipation. 
The wave of liberalism overflowing the country carried in 
its flood liberation from tyrannies of many sorts. The entire 
people were released from bondage of superstition, ignorance 
and authority, and by this fortuitous circumstance the Ger- 
man Jews obtained a share in fee simple of this general 
liberation. 


®* This construction was placed on Judaism by Samuel Hirsch (1815- 
1889). 


98 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


To the German people as a whole this emancipation did 
not release as many restraints as happened to be the case 
among their Jewish fellow-men. In the wake of those influ- 
ences cast by the French Revolution and the tolerant spirit 
fostered by the “Age of Enlightenment,” the entire religious 
life of the Jewish people had to be reshaped. What monu- 
mental modifications and innovations were instituted one 
needs but recall the sad, yes pathetic, situation in which the 
Jews of Europe were seeped. 

in his “The Reform Movement in Judaism,” Dr. D. Philip- 
son, commenting on this period antecedent to the rise of 
modern liberal Judaism, says: 

“The degradation of the Jewish communities of Europe was 
almost complete by the middle of the Eighteenth Century. The 
Jews were cramped intellectually from restriction to Talmudic 
study and the casuistic methods pursued. Judaism was a legal- 
ism. According to that system the technique of jurisprudence 
was imitated. To be sure there was no other avenue of intel- 
lectual pursuit. Fed mentally by identical diet, the splendid 
intellect of the Jew stagnated where it did not cultivate fantastic 
ingenuities of Talmudic argumentation, called pilpulism. Soci- 
ally regarded as pariahs, they were politically degraded to the 
rank of aliens even considered non-existent. Uncouth in dress 
and unkempt, they spoke a jargon which was a conglomeration 
of Middle-High German and Hebrew and liberally sprinkled 
with phrases and terms absorbed from other languages of 
Europe.” 

It was not his political, social and economic life alone which 
impelled the Jews of Germany in general (later France, Eng- 
land, Austria) to create a new adjustment of their religious 
heritage with the exigencies of a more democratic interpreta- 
tion of government. The impedimenta of accumulated tradi- 
tions, superstitions, exhausted values, meaningless ceremonials 
and rituals exempted and preempted of content, enforced the 
Jews of Germany to re-examine the elements of their religion, 
venerable as that was, and hallowed by the sacrifices of 
unnumbered hosts who had suffered martyrdom that it might 
endure. Cumbersome as it appeared, this religious heritage 
enforced the respect due the aged, before whom one rises in 
reverence, and to whom even the last born generation clings 
with a devotion that beggars description. 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 99 


Judaism of antecedent generations was rabbinical legalism 
as has been explained. Fundamental to this interpretation 
of the Jewish religion is the eternal validity of all laws, i. e. 
commandments revealed at Sinai, and the ceremonials which 
are the outgrowth of them. Whether these laws are prescribed 
in Pentateuch or developed by tradition, all are equally bind- 
ing. Fulfillment of these elaborate precepts and command- 
ments were originally dependent upon residence in Palestine. 
The dispersion of the Jewish people (the “Golath,”’ or exile) 
caused these laws to be suspended. When, however, the Jew 
is restored to his ancient patrimony, these laws or command- 
ments will become again binding upon all inhabitants of the 
land whose very atmosphere the rabbis alleged was permeated 
with wisdom. 


Rabbinical Judaism, out of which Reform Judaism emerged, 
stresses the restoration of a nation whose sovereignty was des- 
troyed in the beginning of our common era. Even at that time, 
two thousand years ago, the universal function of the Jew as the 
teacher of religion had not escaped the sages of the Talmud. 
The entire Torah has the aim and purpose of furthering the 
ways of peace and humanizing man, they intimate, thus attrib- 
uting a non-civic or a supercivic destiny to Israel, already as- 
signed them by Abraham when he was commissioned “to be a 
blessing.” For the demand which Judaism makes on the Jew 
is not to convert the world to the religion of the Jew, but to 
spread the knowledge of God and the fundamental relations of 
man to man in terms of brotherhood and love. 


The importance of this emphasis will soon be vindicated. 
Intimations of the non-political or supercivic career for which 
the Jews are enrolled are embodied in their ritual. But accom- 
panying this universal aspiration, a hope was expressed in tradi- 
tional prayers, such as the Shemoneh ’Esreh to “restore the ser- 
vice to the oracle of Thy house. And may our eyes behold thy 
return to Zion in mercy as of yore. Blessed art Thou, O Lord, 
that restorest speedily Thy Shekhinah unto Zion,” in which the 
worshipper would again become a member of a nation under the 
rule of a scion of the house of David. This yearning took root 
in his consciousness. With the restoration of the ancient com- 
monwealth the descendants of Aaron would revive the sacri- 
ficial system and a state religion would be reinstituted with 


100 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


worship of an established form on the ruins of the temple of old.® 
This consummation was central in the religious belief of our 
immediate ancestors. 

So long as the Jews were dispersed, reasoned those who clung 
to rabbinism, they were suffering the penalty of their father’s 
misdeeds in centuries agone. When the full measure of their 
expiation was drawn, then as a result of their repentance and 
purification from sins committed, they would be restored to 
Palestine. This in broad aspects is the outlook of rabbinical 
Judaism, the substratum of Reform Judaism. 

In its initial stages, the reform movement was not a protest 
against nationalistic views of this order, strange as that may 
appear. ‘The agitation that attended the inception of Reform 
Judaism did not penetrate beneath the surface or plumb the 
depths, for the Jewish people of that day were as firmly rivet- 
ted to authority as the followers of the church. The first step 
towards liberalization of this religious heritage was directed 
to externalities. The form and manner of worship in the syna- 
gog was of greater moment to the reformers than the philoso- 
phic and ethical content of that worship. Their enfranchise- 
ment made them self-conscious. They realized that their 
religious services were noisy, lacking in devotional attitude 
and decorum, despite the fervent and insistent demand that 
the ritual be recited with “kavonnah” or reverence. The object 
of the first among modern reforms, say for example Israei 
Jacobson, was to make services of the synagog more attractive 
to the children of his generation who were then coming under 
the liberalizing tendencies of the New Age. Israel Jacobson 
and his followers builded better than they knew, although it 
may be safely ventured that none of them posed as valiant 
champions of a movement that would usher in a dawn of 
redemption for future ages. These men did not regard them- 
selves as saviors of Judaism. What they introduced was 
merely propriety as befits men who shared civic rights and 
privileges with other men not of their faith, who, on attending 
church, were at least as gentlemanly as they were in the bourse. 

Jacobson introduced an organ, a matter of great moment, be 
it noted, at that time, when music of the spheres was the only 
harmony tolerated within the synagogal walls, and a sermon 
in the vernacular. This homiletic adventurer was no stranger 


°Singer’s Standard Bk. of Prayer, p. 66, sqq. 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 101 


in the synagog. Jesus and Paul preached in the synagogs 
of their day, as even before them and after preaching con- 
stituted a part of the Sabbath ritual. It had, however, grown 
into disuse. To speak in the vernacular was tabooed. So an 
organ, a sermon and decorum were in the nature of innnova- 
tions when proposed. There were no doctrinal variations or 
deviations in this program. The particular feature of this inno- 
vation was the violent opposition occasioned by the boldness of 
the step. To what lengths men’s passions drove them in the 
frenzy of fanatical adherence to ancient precedent, review the 
Geiger Tiktin affair in Philipson’s “The Reform Movement in 
Judaism.” The enemies of reform were successful in winning 
the favor of the government which used the strong arm of law 
and order to suppress the radicals. Sermons in German were 
forbidden, an injunction which prompted Zunz to examine the 
origin of the sermon and prove, as he did in his “Die Gottes- 
lientslichen Vortrage der Juden” that homilies have always 
been indigenous with the synagog since post-exilic days. The 
possibility of giving Judaism congregational expression in 
accordance with the encroaching spirit of modernity was wel- 
comed by a very few, notable champions though they were: 
Heine for instance, and Zunz. They were of course the veriest 
minority. 

Without detailing minutely the successive stages that led to 
the introduction of Reform Judaism in Germany, since this sub- 
ject has been treated in full by Philipson in his book on “The 
Reform Movement in Judaism,” from which citations have been 
drawn, one might select the year 1815, the date is arbitrary, 
as the beginning of the reform movement in Germany. At 
that time Israel Jacobson, who had moved to Berlin, held 
religious services in his own home, a perfectly legitimate pro- 
cedure. The service conducted there departed from traditional 
ritual by the substitution of an organ for a cantor, or supple- 
menting this functionary singing by choir, a sermon in the 
vernacular and also a prayer in German instead of a prescribed 
collect from the liturgy. It was a modification of form. The 
religious content and confession echoed the sentiment of 
centuries. 

Attending these services were a few representing the culture 
of Berlin Jewry. Emancipation had not released the masses 
of German Jews from ghettoism, and this movement reached 


102 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


only the enlightened, the “highbrows” of that era. Even so, 
opposition to this measure instigated the Prussian government 
to suppress it. The rabbis of the old school, fearing that these 
daring radicals would overthrow the foundations of Judaism, 
appealed to the government in the name of hundred per cent 
loyalty to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and thus it came to pass 
that in 1817 private synagogs were “verboten.” 

Following this adventure in the no man’s land of heresy at 
Berlin, a reform society was organized in Hamburg, somewhere 
around 1818, by progressive Jewish men and women who came 
under the influence of the private reform organization instituted 
at Berlin. This effort encountered in Hamburg the bitterest 
opposition on the part of those rabbis who feared that the 
authority of the Talmud as the absolute rule for Jewish prac- 
tice would be abrogated, as it was in the latter part of the nine- 
teenth century. These opponents entertained just grounds for 
complaint. Their predictions were true. But their error lodged 
in the assumption that the Talmud and all implied in that con- 
notation was unalterable and eternally binding. Their intui- 
tions convinced them that Talmudic authority was losing pres- 
tige, and so it was, and hence they in all sincerity, (despite the 
suspicion that economic reasons had a share in their resistance 
to reform), fought it tooth and nail. And yet the distinctive 
features that marked the opening of the reform temple in Ham- 
burg on the score of traditional variation, were changes in lit- 
urgy. The services were curtailed and among other modifica- 
tions the prayer invoking divine intervention for the advent of 
the Messiah was omitted. Prayers in German were introduced, 
also sermons. But as Philipson observes: “The aestheticising 
of the service was the seeming be-all and end-all of the 
reformers” in the early period of this reformation, 

The philosophy underlying the reform movement had not yet 
been projected. The recasting of the content of Judaism in 
terms of a Jewish theology had not been undertaken. And yet 
this very task was essential, in order to fortify the generation 
of that age against skepticism, assimilation and atheism and to 
arm them with the conviction that their birth in the household 
of Jacob was no accident nor even a misfortune, but a provi- 
dential act, imposing on them a duty for which they were called. 
They were assigned a place in the sun. 

Jewish thinkers had written philsophically: Philo and Mai- 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 103 


monides are among the leaders of a host of marvelous intellects. 
But their statement of Judaism fitted the era of legalistic, static 
Judaism. What was required by the generation coming to grip 
with nineteenth century problems was the formulization of their 
religious heritage in the light of historical research and literary 
criticism. This desideratum was keenly felt by those rabbis who 
had obtained university training and had come under the spell 
of academic methods of investigation. These very methods, 
when employed in assaying the value of rites and ceremonies 
inherited from the ancient regime, proved them to be expedi- 
ents, evolved by the household of Israel to explain their atti- 
tude and identity with God, and their covenantal relation with 
Him. Under the lense the examination into these institutions 
transmitted from of old showed the tracing of an evolutionary 
growth. A static Judaism insisted that these laws came full 
panoplied from the font of revelation, invested with sanctity 
and irrevocability. The new scientific conscience declared that 
religion evolves man’s concept of God, and hence all that is 
contained and conditioned in the phenomena of Judaism as the 
religion of a historical group, was subject to this cosmic urge 
which rules the spheres as it sways the throb and impulse of 
each human heart. To formulate the digest of this revision, 
which is an interpretation of Judaism, was the labor of a later 
period. It was the contribution offered to their generation by 
the German rabbis who put a historical and philosophic con- 
struction on Judaism in accordance with the scientific methods 
then and thereafter invoked. This substantial basis was made 
possible by means of a number of conferences. 

The rabbinical conferences of Brunswick, Frankfort and 
Breslau, held in 1844, 1845 and 1846, crystalized the zeit-geist 
of that period, and formulated a new statement of the Jewish 
religion. The reformers, like Israel Jacobson, presumed that 
a few reforms in the ritual of the synagog, were the sole 
requirement needed to reconcile the conflict between rabbi- 
nical Judaism and the modern world of industry, democracy and 
disenfranchisement. These progressive men, to whom all rev- 
erence is due, ignored the organic development of Judaism and 
the full sweep of its intent. They hardly can be blamed for this 
shortcoming, since the process was not matured till the middle 
of the century. But public worship alone does not constitute 
Judaism, as is possible in Catholic and Protestant churches. 


104 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


That danger, however, lurks in our congregations of this day. 
The modern opponents of Reform Judaism stigmatize it as 
“anaemic” on the score that it is a mere religion, in the sense of 
an ecclesiastical function, stimulating the emotional phase of the 
individual but failing to link the devotee with a group engaged 
in the toil and turmoil of the Jewish people. 

Differences arising now have been made vocal, but the dis- 
tinctions between orthodox and Reform Judaism in the early days 
were far reaching. The need therefore for a discussion of the 
essentials of their religious heritage and the practical application 
of Jewish doctrines to the situations precipitated by new contacts 
of the Jewish people with their fellow country men became im- 
perative. Those who felt this urge were ipso facto progressive, 
since orthodoxy had its program. The life of the orthodox Jew 
was organized on the basis of codes regulating all their exis- 
tence. Conformity to such a code as the “Shulchan Aruk” sat- 
isfied every need for the ghetto, but not the bourse, and it was 
the bourse and market-place, the factory and parliament, the 
theatre and atelier the Jews were entering, and, in those days, 
welcomed. Orthodox Jewry had no need for conferences then, 
nor has it cultivated the taste today. One would hardly call 
the mass-meeting so much in vogue a conference. It is more 
of a rabble-rousing drive for funds than a conference. The con- 
ferences instituted in the middle of the last century did not claim 
authority to formulate a new Judaism, nor did they assume 
synodal legislation. The intent of these gatherings was to 
obtain an expression of opinion among progressive rabbis on 
those matters of ceremony and ritual, doctrine and profession 
essential to retain Israel in the folds of tradition. 

During those conferences, and as a result thereof, the prob- 
lems of Judaism then dominant were thoroughly studied. Their 
discussion led to very important results. Some problems, to be 
sure, are still unsolved, such as the observance of the traditional 
Sabbath. In the United States the traditional Sabbath outside 
of Jewish institutions and along the Atlantic seaboard is prac- 
tically unobserved. Or in the highly colored phrase used in 
Jewish circles, “the Sabbath is dead.” The acceptance of the 
first day of the week as the civic day of rest has become general 
in the middle west and yet religious services as legitimate on that 
day as another are not as readily introduced as one might infer. 
Thus attesting to the conservatism of the Jewish people and to 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 105 


the many unfinished tasks transmitted by these conferences to 
the Jewish people today. 

The Breslau conference, for example, to illustrate in part their 
methods and the serious preoccupations that engaged the con- 
{freres, recognized officially the total exhaustion of the value 
accorded the second day observance of the festivals. This had 
now lost its significance in the United States and has no meaning 
here save for employees in Jewish institutions who gain thereby 
an additional holiday. The conference declared among other 
measures that the customs in connection with death and mourn- 
ing, such as tearing of clothes, abstention from shaving, sitting 
on earth and the like were survivals of earlier decades and had 
now lost their significance and were inconsistent with religious 
sentiments. 

The problems of the conferences are treated in full by Philip- 
son in his book on the “Reform Movement in Judaism,” and need 
not be repeated. Hints only are given of them, that it may point 
the direction of the new era. The position of woman in home 
and synagog, for instance, was as a result of these conferences 
stated in progressive terms. The subject forms a part of this 
book and is surveyed in that chapter. Briefly, the conferences 
declared that the Jewish woman was entitled to the same 
religious duties as man which, it is safe to say, was a slap in the 
austere face of orientalism. Furthermore, the notion that woman 
was in religion inferior to man was nullified, and that a girl was 
obligated from youth up to participate in religious instruction. 
What was even more avowedly radical and made orthodox 
Jewry hot under the collar, was the recognition of woman as an 
individual who could be counted for “minyan,” the religious 
quorum. 

In summarizing these conferences wherein many traditional 
but valueless ceremonials were annulled, Dr. Philipson says: 
“The Rabbinical conferences will remain for all time among the 
most remarkable gatherings in the history of Judaism. It was 
here that the great truths received public expression that Judaism 
contained in itself the power of adaptation to changing needs 
and conditions of life in successive ages of the world’s progress. 
It was here that the spirit of Jewish tradition and the spirit of 
modernity were welded.” 

Thus is became evident then, that to give Judaism its true 
interpretation, not merely as a memory and a replica of the past, 


106 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


but also as a proclamation of truths and duties for those living 
in this new age, it was necessary to obtain a definite statement 
of the religious consciousness, a philosophy of Judaism, or at best 
a theology. From these leaders came the assurance that one’s 
affiliation with the community of Israel was conditioned on a 
fact of greater vitality than mere birth in the household of a 
Jew. Duties ensued as a consequence. A Jewish birth was in 
that very condition the origin and source of obligations imposed 
on the Jewish group to which one was born, and these had to 
be discharged. These pioneers regarded each Jewish soul as 
a priest of God who is chosen to carry into the world the pro- 
fession of one God and to bear the burden of effecting this 
knowledge among men. In emphasizing the universal aspects 
instead of the national aspirations of Judaism they constructed 
religion in the light of prophetic forecasts which assigned Israel 
a messianic career—the “light” unto all humanity, of Deutro- 
Isaiah. In place of former national views they set up an inter- 
pretation affecting all humanity, and carried this conception to 
more logical conclusions than their Biblical or post-Biblical 
forbears. 

To obtain these statements of principles was a task no confer- 
ence could undertake until there had been an expression of 
convictions among certain individuals qualified to do so, which 
a conference might crystalize. Such studies were being carried 
out to enable the Reform Movement under way to merit the 
sanction of tradition and at the same time the approval of mod- 
ern scientific methods whose deductions were entering into the 
consciousness of men today. In the Midrash, Bereshith Rab- 
bah, it is said of Akiba and Jehudah ha-Nasi and others that at 
the death of his predecessor a sun went down and a sun rose; 
the meaning is that when God permits the sun of a righteous 
man to set (i. e. when he dies), He permits the sun of another 
righteous man to rise. (Paragraph 58.) The value of the analogy 
is this, that in the passing of the old order of rabbinical scholars, 
men of vast Talmudic erudition, a sun of equal brilliancy 
flushed the fact of the dawning century. A host of scholars 
anticipated by Mendelsohn with Zunz as their dean and possibly 
pattern, scholars like Steinschneider, Jost, Geiger, Gratz and 
later philosophers like Lazarus, Samuel Hirsch and Einhorn, 
still later I. M. Wise, Kohler, Landsberg, E. G. Hirsch (the 
list is not exhausted) stood on the parapets and said to the vast 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 107 


store of literature accumulated during the ages, what Hamlet 
said to the ghost: “stand and unfold thyself.” This meant 
research. This literature spanning the stretch of centuries was 
forced to confess its reason for being. What motivated the 
authors in composing it? What swing and swirl of conflict and 
contention was registered therein? Whatever deductions 
obtained from reading, as Zunz did the thousand and more 
religious poems, piyyutim, scattered over the habitable world 
fortified the reform rabbis in their argument that Judaism was 
a process of continuous revelation rather than a product of laws. 

The revelation at Sinai once declared irrevocable was now 
regarded as a symptom of evolution. God does not reveal him- 
self once and then depart from all human concerns and interests. 
His spirit is constantly unfolding to the seers of our own day. 
Examining history wherein the events of humanity are revealed 
shows that there is a continuation in the stream of revelation 
which enlightened our generation, as the revelation at Sinai 
brightened ancient days. 

These emanations on continuous revelation are clothed in 
garments borrowed from most accessible sources, as is instanced 
by the ceremonials and rites of the Jewish people. These cere- 
monials are assimilations, in large measure, from a common 
Semitic ancestry.’ The intent of the ceremonial was the essen- 
tial factor and its ethical import often symbolized, took prece- 
dence over its fulfillment as a discharge of a ceremonial obliga- 
tion. The idea invested in the rite which had ever an ethical 
implication reminding man of some duty and worthy action 
assumed a larger share of attention than mere ritualistic 
conformity. 

For the German youths growing to manhood and womanhood 
in this period of enlightenment, the restatement of the heritage 
of Israel, in terms of modern science was imperative. By 
establishing the eternally valid in Judaism, the teachers of 
reform hoped to retain the German youth within the folds and 
not give them over a prey to atheism and apostacy. They had to 
be shown that the Torah, though it is written in a Semitic 
tongue, still “speaks in the language of the sons of men.”* It 
outlines duties in the fulfilling of which there is great reward, 
but these duties are moral obligations binding on all humanity. 


7™“Rolk-Lore and the Old Testament,” by Sir J. G. Frazer, 
5T. B. Berokoth, 33b. 


108 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


Upon Israel is laid the task of teaching these duties of human 
conduct that all men may have a share in the bliss resulting from 
the pursuit of justice and righteousness, which is the applica- 
tion of Jewish teaching. 

The Jews were, in consequence of the position taken by these 
reform leaders, a religious people, not a nation in the political 
sense. The term people is not coextensive with nation. A 
nation always implies a political unity, and this condition had 
been outgrown by the Jews. There came to them as a result 
of their Jewish birth, this burden of moral obligation, the exem- 
plar and director of conduct that earth might be tilled and made 
habitable for the children of men. Religion, particularly the 
manifestation of their Jewish religion, was the application and 
expression of an ideal, the reaction of a thought, a reflection of 
an inner light forever kindled on the altar of service. A rite 
fulfilled for the sake of fulfilling it was an abomination.’ Rites 
were stimulations, incentives towards action, and all action when 
wrought for mankind and when motivated for good, hastened 
the kingdom of God. Their particular social obligation was 
heightened to religious sanctity by the years of martyrdom, hero- 
ism and devotion with which their ancestors had endeavored to 
{fulfill this group covenant. This association of centuries is a 
covenantal relation. In each age the medium of discharging the 
obligations of that covenantal relationship changes, or is changed 
by exigencies of social, political, economic circumstances. The 
Jew is not cut off from his humanity. He is a part of humanity, 
and shares with his humanity the fortune or misfortunes of the 
state. 

The fundamental doctrines of Judaism, as the rabbis of reform 
conceived them, were universal in application. The concept 
that man was created in the image of God was fundamental, and 
implied that man was capable of godly things, of imitating God, 
the High and Lofty One who inhabits Eternity. Reason alone 
does not enable man to comprehend God. Man is permitted an 
approach to the heights where the glory of the Shekinah abides. 
Scientific terminology alone does not explain, nor poetry, but 
the vision of poetry must lend penetration to philosophy and 
science to give cogency and reality to the concept of God. Man 
strives to know God through those attributes ascribed to Him. 


°“For all art is primarily, not a contemplation but a doing, a creative 
action, and morality is so pre-eminently.”—Havelock Ellis. 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 109 


In the symbolization of justice, love, mercy, truth and righteous- 
ness, man exhibits his divine heritage. 

Son of the Most High is he, and this dicta carries with it the 
valid injunction of illustrating that belief in practice. To 
believe in God and not demonstrate that belief in human con- 
duct, is to do the thing that the Lord despises. Poetry locates God 
within the soul of man and since the dynamic currents of our 
being are started from within our consciousness, the language of 
poetry is as sound as scientific terms. The indwelling of God 
and the upsurging of the divine element of man impose respon- 
sibilities and exact duties of man. He cannot live for and unto 
himself alone. He belongs to humanity and therefore must work 
for the common good in whatever way he is able. This is the 
only method of attesting his belief. To live these convictions is 
to practice the Jewish religion. 

The fundamentals or roots of Judaism are set up on this kinship 
of God and man. Each human being is a manifestation of deity. 
Our lives are given us and are our own to make them divine, 
a pattern of God, who being our Father we, His children, par- 
take of Him, by means of those attributes we, as human beings, 
have evolved and ascribe unto the Most High. In a sense, man 
does create God. The God man creates is an extension of his 
sublimest aspirations. From within his soul, the source of his 
conscious life, there upsurges this yearning, the hunger of the 
spirit for the all encompassing totality of existence. The recog- 
nition in western civilizations of a personal relationship between 
God and man is adopted in part from Judaism which enjoined 
deportment of one’s self in conformity to that conception of kin- 
ship with the High and Lofty One who is enthroned in eternity. 

The deviation of Judaism from a tribal religion is the empha- 
sis placed by the Jews on their historical obligation as has been 
stated. This was brought to the fore by the reform rabbis whose 
particular interpretation of this obligation lent the Jews the 
only uniqueness they enjoy, apart from their humanity. For it 
cannot be too often repeated that Judaism and humanity are 
synonymous. Were this historical obligation not interlinked 
with their existence, they might become a mere ethical culture 
group not bound by historical duty nor beholden to the sacred 
trusts imposed on a people identified, as is the case of Israel, 
with a cause. The Jew is under the compulsion of identifying 
himself with his historical mission before the eyes of all men. 


110 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


The unique burden is detailed the Jew to teach this knowledge 
of God unto all men, and to illustrate it by living a life of ser- 
vice, in accordance with these ideas, to the end that he, by so 
living, may bring to pass a condition here on earth when man- 
kind will no longer hurt nor destroy by organized agencies. 
That this is a far off event, so significant as to warrant the desig- 
nation “divine,” does not impair the value of the aspiration nor 
chill the ardor of those Utopian dreams from the days of the 
unknown poet of Scripture who first voiced them, unto this last 
day when H. G. Wells hypothesizes a state of social order as 
messianic as that forevisioned by Israel’s seers. 

In this consecration there is reflected the belief in the election 
of Israel to demonstrate the knowledge of God to mankind. 
This is a distinction of birth unlike royalty in that it is a priv- 
ilege and an additional call to social service. This cause filled 
the lives of the Jewish people with a purpose. He had as an 
investment of history, an allotted task. Having a cause to uphold, 
the Jew finds himself in a world that is not meaningless and 
chaotic, nor a mechanism ruled by chance and caprice, over 
which he has no discernible control. On the contrary, the human 
being is sent here to realize his career. To evolve that destiny, 
each one shares with the creative spirit in the effort to bring 
this messianic era to pass. By working either by mind or muscle 
every one realizes his creative destiny. Work is therefore not 
a curse placed upon the human being. Work is the “co-efficient 
of human dignity.” That God works is a doctrine Judaism 
makes bold to defend. “God works without regard for reward, in 
order to increase the sum of human life and love,” to subdue 
the earth to the uses of man and to make it more habitable. 

The purpose Israel is elected to serve is this sanctification 
of man, a recognition therefore of the worthiness of each human 
being. It does not mean a levelling of humanity to one stand- 
ard of mediocrity, but aims to awaken desire and aspiration in 
all to attain excellence and to quicken within each a large and 
liberal discontent. This duty of proclaiming a high destiny as 
the lot of man is reenforced by centuries of devotion to the 
cause of furthering the culture, civilization, art, science, com- 
merce, industry and governments of various groups of peoples 
on the globe. This duty is, furthermore, imposed by the forces 
of history, and constitutes their covenant. He was of old and 
remains today bearer of the arc of this Torah. 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 111 


Judaism becomes in this light cast upon it by the pioneers of 
reform, not the fulfillment of a set of inflexible ritualistic ordi- 
nances but a “way of life,’ a doctrine controlling action and 
conduct in the larger contacts of an emancipated people in democ- 
racies. The very result of this preachment induced cooperation 
and partnership with other peoples. The medium whereby these 
attitudes of fellowship, cooperation and services are expressed 
were the ceremonials which served as conveyors or vessels con- 
taining the essence of the new spirit. Take, for example, the 
attitude of Reform Judaism toward the Sabbath. 

The interpretation placed on the Sabbath by the Jews of 
Reform proclivities illustrates the position taken by them towards 
their religious heritage: (a) on the testimony of astronomical 
science the reform teacher said a universal Sabbath day, one 
day intended for all Jews to keep at an identical time, hinged 
on the notion of a flat earth. There being no possibility of 
observing at an identical hour the world over the ritual of the 
Sabbath, the injunction of the day per se was invalidated: (b) 
western civilization had enforced the participation of the Jew 
on the last day of the week and a cessation from labors on the 
first. Sentimentality alone defended a discarded Sabbath. 
Rather than exhaust the value of the Sabbath idea by ignoring 
the Sabbath day, the Reform rabbis urged and instituted wor- 
ship on Sunday morning. 

The Sabbath was not intended as a sign of Israel’s distinction 
from other peoples, the reform teachers argued, nor was it a 
day surrendered to pleasure-seeking and relaxation. It is meant 
to establish in man the conviction that he is superior to nature 
and able to control it, not the subject or slave but the master of 
materials. Man is created to work. He expresses his sover- 
eignty over the things of earth by means of labor. By working 
it is intended that labor be not motivated by the fear and 
coercion imposed on a slave. The Sabbath, so Reform Judaism 
announces, is ordained to endow man with strength which 
replenished by rest, he may gain new stimulus for creative effort. 
Were man the servant of nature, and not the the master, there 
would not be a day of rest and refreshment of mind and spirit. 
Man would completely duplicate the endless rotation of a 
machine. The Sabbath consummates the weekly cycle where, 
as the climax of labor, man merits the release from the monotony 
of his daily tasks. His day of rest comes then with true dig- 


112 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


nity, the counterpart of worthy service, not a release, for 
leisure and license, but moments of relaxation accompanied by 
refreshment in spirit and for hours of sociability. Six days 
of labor and one of rest are sequence and antecedent, one of 
the other, and make the observance of the Sabbath valued, 
whether observed on the traditional seventh day or the first 
day of the week, six days of labor are commanded that the 
seventh day of rest ensues not as a reward or a bribe, but a rec- 
ognition of man’s own control over the things of earth, and wit- 
nessing to the Creator ruling above nature in absolute freedom. 

When the Reform Movement gained a degree of self-con- 
sciousness the traditional ceremonials of the synagog were recre- 
ated to conform to convictions of later days. For it could not 
be the doctrines of the Reform Movement alone that would 
lend stability to American Judaism. These threatened to become 
mere abstractions when unrelated to actualities and unapplied in 
daily affairs. Forms and institutions characteristic of the relig- 
ious genius of the people, and expressive symbolically of definite 
ideas in religion and ethics were required. Tradition equipped the 
Jewish people with these forms and institutions and the vitality 
of Judaism enabled it to create new forms to express ideas of 
the times and invest old ceremonials with new meanings. 

A few of these ceremonials and institutions which Reform 
Judaism rejuvenated ought to be mentioned. Passover, for 
example, originally an inspiring festival of a crude agricultural 
era, was transformed in later ages into a festival of redemption. 
In primitive times this spring festival served as an occasion to 
consecrate tents and herds. Later this festival was associated 
with the deliverance of the Hebrews from Egypt. The unleav- 
ened bread reminded later generations of the hasty exodus of 
their fathers from the “land of oppression.” “Thus, the spring 
festival became a memorial of the springtide of liberty for all 
the nations and at the same time a consecration of the Jewish 
home to the covenant of the God of Israel. God was to enter 
the Jewish home as He did in Egypt, as the Redeemer and 
Protector of Israel.”2° Moreover, this festival of springtime fills 
the soul with joy and hope. This feast of redemption promises 
liberty from whatever form of oppression burdens the body and 
soul of mankind. 

The Feast of Weeks was another farmer’s holiday at the 
~The Theology of Judaism, by Kohler, p. 462. 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 113 


end of the first seven weeks of harvest. According to rabbinical 
Judaism this agricultural festival of thanksgiving for early crops 
assured, was transformed into a historical feast by making it 
the memorial of the giving of the Ten Words on Mount Sinai. 
The ingathering of the first fruits was symbolized into the 
ripening of the first fruits of the spiritual harvest for the people 
of the covenant. Congregations of Israel, through their young, 
pledged themselves anew to fulfill the commandments. Early 
in the development of the Reform Movement this festival was 
utilized by reform rabbis as a confirmation day. It thus became 
a consecration of the Jewish youth to the ancient covenant of 
service and a renewal of loyalty on the part of the young to, 
assume responsibilities imposed by their Jewish birth. In this 
spirit confirmation day is observed by American Jews unto the 
present hour. It is not a confession of faith, but the affirmation 
of duty to their humanity. 

A like transformation was effected in regard to the Feast 
of Tabernacles. In Biblical times this was an important festival. 
It was in the post-exilic priestly code connected with the 
exodus from Egypt. The Reform rabbis retained the spirit of 
the festival which was one of gladness and gratitude to God 
for his protection of Israel and His providential guidance during 
the first centuries of Israel’s pilgrimage through all lands. 

The two holidays that have received the most universal 
response among Jewish people of this country are New Year’s 
and the Day of Atonement. 

The sublime truth voiced in the New Year’s day ceremonial 
is the glorious realization that man possesses the capacity to 
renew his heart so that he may harmonize himself with the 
“great Judge on high and receive life anew from His hands.” ° 
Reborn spiritually by this conviction, he can with vigor and 
courage dedicate himself to the unfinished tasks of his own 
career and that of his fellow-men. 

The Day of Atonement has undergone many transforma- 
tions. Originally on this time (among other quaint rites such 
as banishing a goat to the demon of the desert, Azazel) the 
high priest in the temple expiated the sins of the people. The 
day was one of communion with God for the High priest alone. 
He confessed his sins and those of the people. Forgiveness 
was implored for all the people by the priest, who, it was actually 
believed, beheld God’s majesty. 


114 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


In contrast to this priestly monopoly the rabbis, who fostered 
the reform movement in accordance with well established tradi- 
tion, invested the Day of Atonement with the doctrine of God’s 
mercy and paternal love, an interpretation that is fully in accord 
with prophetic Judaism. Atonement, they concluded, could not 
be obtained by priest with sacrificial blood or incense or a 
scapegoat. But every son of Israel was to spend the day in 
the House of Prayer, confessing his sins before God, in order 
to obtain pardon. But this pardon is wrought by one’s inner 
consciousness and registers the conquests over one’s evil inclina- 
tions. A guilt confessed is half redressed. A resolution firmly 
formed to rise above the injustice that cleaves to one’s hands, 
and to cease from evil speech that clings to one’s lips is a means 
of effecting atonement. A penitent soul is then heartened to 
improve his way as a servant of humanity. On this Day of 
Atonement Israel rises up to the heights of aspiration and 
calls to the universal God. Hopes that reach the stars now 
become vocal. Not for himself alone or unto himself as a Jew 
is the consummation of his achievements here on earth directed. 
He voices the hope that eventually God’s covenant will embrace 
all earth-born children. That all humanity may attain this 
blessed state of peace and prosperity was Israel summoned of 
old. On this Day of Atonement he renews his faith in the 
ultimate triumph of justice, love and mercy. When this destiny 
is achieved, Israel will cease to be. But until that destiny is 
attained he must labor with unshaken confidence for this united 
humanity. 

In this explanation of the Day of Atonement no mention 
has been made of the oriental methods of self-chastisement, 
fasting. Usually the Jewish people abstain from all material 
things on that Day, forgetful of the world outside. American 
Judaism recognizes the traditional rite, but lends it faint support. 
In those cases it is not a sentiment, it is, as observed, a super- 
stition. Yom Kippur is an orison and aspires to lift man up 
that he may stand amid eternal ways. On this elevated station 
Reform Judaism placed it. 

At a cursory glance, the expansion registered in these ancient 
ritualistic ceremonies forces home the conviction that during 
the nineteenth century, the rabbis who extricated a spiritual 
and ethical symbolism therefrom recast the institutions of Juda- 
ism and imparted an intent to it synchronous with the spirit of 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 115 


the age. In the early part of that century, and by means of 
the methodology evolved by them, particularly Geiger, the 
Reform rabbis of Germany prepared the ground work of their 
argument. They justified their position, i.e., the historical 
continuity of Judaism, by utilizing academic technique in exam- 
ining the sources of the religious consciousness among Jewish 
people. For, as Dr. K. Kohler* said of his own illustrious teacher, 
Samson Raphael Hirsch, he and the rabbis of the old school 
had not the faintest idea of the historical growth of language 
and law, of custom and tradition and post-Talmudic Judaism. 
All of his ilk held to the principles of stability which would 
construe the religion of Judaism as a bundle of laws and stat- 
utes, formulated in sections and paragraphs for the avowed 
design of making Judaism a product of a creed, the national 
profession of a distinct race. The reform rabbis indulged in 
an exploration of post-biblical, patristic literature, the apoc- 
rypha, the Talmuds, midrashim, responsa, commentaries and rit- 
uals. This survey equipped them with the conviction that ger- 
minal ideas were continually unfolding. The unique inspiration 
that was kindled in the soul of the Jew could not be paralleled by 
another people, in that the soul which God had created was pure 
and also free. It was their mission to know how through the 
consciousness of the Jew one increasing purpose runs, and that 
purpose was to make God one and His name one. The same 
is being interpreted in our day to mean consolidation of human- 
ity on the side of labor and on the side of property, to the end 
that men work not for selfishness and for personal profit but to 
lend themselves to their humanity, that through their indi- 
vidual labor they establish here a more perfect union, a vaster 
and more tenable commonwealth. 

This, in the main, is the undertow of reform Judaism. It has 
not been detailed in academic style. It has been presented in 
bold relief without excrescences and the superfluous luggage of 
citations. This aspect of the Reform Movement constitutes the 
ground swell of that religious interpretation booming on the 
shores of American Judaism. 

For, after the Breslau Conference in 1846, several of the 
reform rabbis of Germany located in the United States. The 
reform movement therefore had its inception in Germany, yet in 
America, this movement found its freest and most logical devel- 


“Memorial Volume on his 70th birthday. 


116 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


opment. As Dr. Philipson says: “It was in most instances 
German preachers and thinkers who shaped the cuurse of Amer- 
ican Jewish congregations.” The connecting link between these 
German university trained rabbis who combined the scientific 
academic technique exacted by library and laboratory with 
traditional rabbinical erudition and American Judaism, is trans- 
parent. The historical and philosophical formulization of con- 
cepts and doctrines, as the German reform pioneers evolved 
them, was practically applied in this country. 

The first reform congregation organized in the United States 
is credited to Beth Elohim, Charleston, S. C. In the year 1824, 
forty-seven members, dissatisfied with the prevailing order of 
services, memorialized their board of trustees to have the ritual 
reformed. In their petition they referred to the religious agita- 
tion stirring German Jewry at that time. 


With the exception of this congregation in Charleston, there 
were no steps taken anywhere in the United States in the inter- 
est of reform before the year 1840. After that date societies 
were formed among German Jewish settlers and called “Reform 
Vereine” organized for the purpose of worship according to the 
convictions then current in the land of their birth. These 
societies eventually organized themselves into reform congre- 
gations of which Har Sinai, Baltimore; Keneseth Israel, Phila- 
delphia; Emanual, New York, and Sinai, Chicago, are illustrious 
examples.” 

The membership of these reform congregations were recruited 


2% The “Kore Bamidbar,” by B. Felsenthal (d. 1908), was the Magna 
Charta of Sinai Congregation, Chicago. (Reform Advocate, Nov. 18, 
1922.) The keynote of this booklet is the slow development of rabbinic 
law. Orthodoxy contended that rabbinism was the outflow of divine 
revelation, of equal authority with Biblical law. His researches influ- 
enced by Zunz, revealed the fallacy of this contention, Rabbinic law was 
also an evolutionary process and many of its interpretations were dis- 
closed to be based on mis-interpretations of the Biblical text. Rabbinic 
ingenuity had aimed to build a fence around the law was resolved into 
the minimum requirement necessary to fulfill the commandment—at best 
a trick to circumvent the law by legalism itself. 


“The members of this congregation abandoned the theory of Tal- 
mudism entirely. Judaism, they insisted, was not dry law. It is ethical 
instruction. Religion is the quest for humanity, not the compliance out of 
fear or greed with a will of some external power. The inception of this 
view was traced to the religion of the prophets. The teachers of Reform 
Judaism showed that the message and the meaning of the prophets of 
Israel were quite the reverse of legalism and sacerdotalism.” 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM lit 


for the most part from among young men recently arrived from 
Germany. The leading spirits of these congregations had come 
under the direct influence of reform rabbis abroad. Hence 
the transition from the orthdoxy of the continent to progres- 
sive, liberal Judaism, American Judaism was logical and natural. 

Since 1860, the Reform Movement has made great progress 
in the United States. As Dr. Philipson says: “There are few 
congregations of influence that have not adopted reforms of 
some kind. Even those congregations that consider themselves 
conservative in this country would, in European lands, be looked 
upon as reform. While orthodox synagogs are increasing, many 
o{ their members after living in this country for some time 
affiliate with reform congregations. The spirit of American 
democracy does not pact with the inhibitions of rabbinical legal- 
ism. The children of immigrants do not follow the traditional 
ceremonialism of their parents. Frequently they forswear 
religion entirely and array themselves with movements and 
measures whose purpose is solely materialistic.” But, despite 
the fact that reform Judaism is the religious conviction of a 
minority, the universal truths announced by the great leaders 
of reform in this country: Max Lilienthal, Isaac M. Wise, David 
Einhorn, Samuel Adler, Dr. K. Kohler, Samuel Hirsch, E. G. 
Hirsch, Max Landsberg, shaped the policy of American Jewish 
congregations and prepared the foundations for a Judaism which 
has the hall marks of American construction. 

These congregations whose influence has been most felt in 
preparing the Jews of America for a Judaism conformative to 
the American free spirit, formulated in the Pittsburg Conference 
of 1885, their declaration of principles. This conference called 
by Dr. K. Kohler gave succinct expression to the theology of 
the Reform Movement and stands to this day as the embodiment 
of the central concepts of Reform Judaism. 

Briefly, this Pittsburg platform recognized in every religion 
an attempt to grasp the infinite. “We hold,” it said, “that 
Judaism represents the highest conception of the God-idea as 
taught in our Holy Seriptures and developed and spiritualized 
by the Jewish teachers in their respective ages. We maintain 
that Judaism preserved and defended amidst continual struggles 
and trials and under enforced isolation, this God-idea as the 
central religious truth for the human race. 

“We recognize in the Bible the record of the consecration of 


118 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


the Jewish people, its mission as the priest of the one God, and 
value it as the most potent instrument of religious and moral 
instruction. We hold that the modern discoveries of scientific 
researches in the domain of nature and history are not antagon- 
istic to the doctrines of Judaism, the Bible reflecting the primi- 
tive ideas of its own age, and at times clothing its conception 
of divine Providence and Justice dealing with man in miracu- 
lous narratives. 

“We recognize in the Mosaic legislation a system of training 
the Jewish people for its mission during its national life in 
Palestine, and today we accept as binding only its moral laws, 
and maintain only such ceremonies as elevate and sanctify our 
lives, but reject all such as are not adapted to the views and 
habits of modern civilization. 

“We hold that all such Mosaic and rabbinical laws as regu- 
late diet, priestly purity and dress, originated in ages and 
under the influence of ideas entirely foreign to our present 
mental and spiritual state. They fail to impress the modern 
Jews with a spirit of priestly holiness; their observance in our 
day is apt rather to obstruct than to further modern spiritual 
elevation. 

“We recognize in the modern era of universal culture of heart 
and intellect the approaching of the realization of Israel’s gredt 
Messianic hope for the establishment of the kingdom of truth, 
justice and peace among all men. We consider ourselves no 
longer a nation, but a religious community, and therefore expect 
neither a return to Palestine, nor a sacrificial worship under the 
sons of Aaron, nor the restoration of any of the laws concerning 
the Jewish state. 

“We recognize in Judaism a progressive religion, ever striv- 
ing to be in accord with the postulates of reason. We are 
convinced of the utmost necessity of preserving the historical 
identity with our great past. Christianity and Islam being 
daughter religions of Judaism, we appreciate their providential 
mission to aid in the spreading of monotheistic and moral truth. 
We acknowledge that the spirit of broad humanity of our age 
is our ally in the fulfillment of our mission, and therefore we 
extend the hand of fellowship to all who operate with us in 
the establishment of the reign of truth and righteousness among 
men. 

“We reassert the doctrine of Judaism that the soul is immor- 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 119 


tal, grounding this belief on the divine nature of the human 
spirit, which forever finds bliss in righteousness and misery 
in wickedness. We reject as ideas not rooted in Judaism the 
beliefs both in bodily resurrection and in Paradise and Hell as 
abodes of everlasting punishment and reward. 

“Tn full accordance with the spirit of Mosaic legislation 
which strives to regulate the relations between rich and poor, 
we deem it our duty to participate in the great task of modern 
times; to solve on the basis of justice and righteousness the 
problems presented by the contrasts and evils of the present 
organization of society.” 

In later years, this platform has been enlarged upon, as in 
the adoption of a social justice platiorm, to be treated in the 
final chapter, in 1920 and the addition of a prayer quivering with 
the social conscience of the age for the Day of Atonement in 
the last revision of the Union Prayer Book, Vol. II. Follow- 
ing the process of evolution as unfolded in the consciousness 
of the Jewish people, the cardinal ideas of American Jews are 
set forth in this Pittsburg platform. These, it has been shown, 
are an outgrowth of previous era and the Pittsburg platform 
provides the fulcrum wherewith to move the Jewish world of 
later days. It is not static—it could not be so and remain 
American, 

And yet the American Jew is in the minority among his 
Jewish brethren in the United States. Reform Judaism, it 
must be noted, had not made any noticeable headway in Russia 
and Eastern Europe, from whence the majority of recent immi- 
grants came. Attempts had been made to introduce certain 
innovations of ceremonial and ritual into Russia without avail.'* 
The life of the Russian Jew—this refers to the tragic Czaristie 
period—a like stricture applies to Galician and Polish Jews— 
was dominated by rigid conservative principles. Through this 
wall of ceremonial no cultural influences from without could 
penetrate. The old scheme of family life, with all its patri- 
archal survivals remained. The youth of that sorrow-stricken 
country was held in the vise of discipline. Not the slightest 
deviation from a custom, a rite or the “mores” was permitted. 
To read a book in a foreign tongue was reprehensible. ‘The 
mental energy of the Russian Jewish youth was absorbed in 


* The Life of Max Lilienthal, by D. Philipson. 


120 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


Talmudism. The synagogs which served as houses of study 
were frequented by thousands of Talmudic students,” says Dub- 
now. In those academies mentality, erudition and dialectic 
subtlety were valued above every other intellectual attainment. 
A scholastic education of this character resulted in unfitting the 
students for the battle of life. The men spent their days 
“in study” as it was styled, an aimless speculation, while the 
women, excluded from study and considered inferior, took charge 
of business and became the wage earners. This is the picture 
as Dubnow draws it, and his authority is not disputed. 


In this era, when Russian Jews were deprived of any privilege 
granted by their barbaric government, certain aberrations of 
Judaism, such as chassidism and mysticism—their modern reviy- 
als in this country are treated in the chapter on neo-chassidic 
tendencies—enjoyed luxuriant growth. Between these esoteric 
movements and rabbinism the conflict of Akiba Eger and Bal 
Shem, for example, there was vigorous antagonism and protest. 
It was a cleavage affecting first principles. The rabbis, zealous 
for a sane life as well as a sane religion, fought the mystics 
and the superstitions of the chassidim with their pet saint 
esconced in a palace “cleaving to God” with unsparing rigor. 
Gradually the firm hand of rabbinism obtained a secure clutch 
on the Russian Jew and held him rigid. The agitation of 
German Jews for a modification and readjustment of their reli- 
gious heritage did not affect the mass of Russian Jews. To the 
overwhelming majority, Reform Judaism is first demonstrated 
in this country where the East European Jews come in contact 
with it. Their first year in the United States is strictly ortho- 
dox, although the number of recent immigrants who are without 
religious affiliation is appalling. 


The recent arrivals, fewer and decreasing with stricter immi- 
gration laws, come under the influence of institutions established 
by Reform Jews. They witness its methods and learn its intent. 
Even when not affiliated with reform congregations, the pattern 
of American Judaism designed by the previous generation of 
German Jews is accepted as the standard of American Judaism, 
as the organization among the United Synagogs of America, 
an avowedly orthodox organization of traditional Judaism, in 
imitation of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, 


% History of the Jews in Russia and Poland. 


THE PREDECESSOR OF AMERICAN JUDAISM 121 


the outspoken champion from its organization by Dr. I. M. Wise 
in 1876 of Reform Judaism. Each generation has a right to 
decide what is the true value of religious practice.* For Ameri- 
can Jews, the ritual and construction of Judaism as prepared by 
rabbis who received their training in Germany has become the 
accepted stamp of Jewish worship in America. 


There are in round numbers some two hundred and fifty 
reform congregations’® in the United States, those enrolled on 
the roster of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations 
representing the American type of Jewish worship most accept- 
able in this country. But this does not betoken a majority. 
Reform Jews in America are a minority, and while the second 
and third generation of orthodox parents are often found within 
reform synagogs, still this influx does not upset the balance— 
American Jews are still a minority. 

Confronted by an overwhelming majority, a deduction natur- 
ally inferred might conclude that reform congregations would 
gradually disintegrate and disappear. But this tragic end has 
not been the fate of reform congregations in the United States. 
Evidences tend to show that the disintegration takes place in 
the religious organizations of the majority party. Congrega- 
tional perpetuity is maintained by a transmission of obligation 
toward the organized congregation from father to son, literally 
and figuratively. In the congregation of the majority party 
there are few if any instances of this transmission—a bold state- 
ment to make—wherein a father has been succeeded in congre- 
gational office of any sort by a son. Those instances wherein 
the children of the majority party accept the synagogal affilia- 
tion of their parents are so rare as to warrant one to hymn the 
marvel. But in American Reform Congregations sons have 
succeeded their fathers in office unto the second and third gener- 
ation: B’nai Jeshurun, Cincinnati; Keneseth Israel, Philadelphia ; 
Sinai Congregation, Chicago. 

The ascendancy of Jews of German birth was interrupted by 
the accession of legions of Jews from eastern and southern 


* “Knowing that there has always been progress and development in 
Judaism according to a Talmudic principle, the teachers of every genera- 
tion are the sole arbiters to decide for that generation what is authoritative 
in Jewish teaching.”—Prof. J. Z. Lauterbach in C.C.A.R. Yr. Bk., Vol. 
31, p. 220. 

#1923. data. 


122 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


Europe who were not responsive to the feeble efforts made tc 
introduce Reform Judaism into their European synagogs as Dr. 
Max Lilienthal?’ in his early life sought. Were American Juda- 
ism dependent on numbers alone there would not be a Jewish 
religious preachment here savoring of the United States. Judg- 
ing by various published statements from representatives of 
the majority party, that construction of Judaism most in favor, 
were the majority able to so impose it—would be reactionary, 
and nationalistic, with avowed sympathy for a modified pietism, 
revived from mediaeval aberration and obsessions for fictitious 
or plaster saints. 

Reform Judaism, it was charged by the majority through their 
various self-appointed spokesmen, declared it is a device on the 
part of wealthy American Jews to shun or deny their Judaism, 
and to make it at all times a “religion of convenience” Yet, in 
spite of this indictment unsupported by the evidence, there are 
fewer backsliders among the American Jews than in any other 
country under the sun. The record already inscribed with the 
large hearted deeds and sincere religious zeal of American Jews 
makes it a glowing tribute to the permanent validity and 
legitimacy of American Judaism. The American standards set 
up by Jews of German parentage in fulfillment of aspirations 
voiced by rabbis immersed in the religious awakening fostered 
in Germany has become the chief standard. This American 
“minhag” prevails because it is most compatible with political 
democracy and our industrial civilization. By eliminating from 
Judaism outworn racial, tribal, even national integuments, such 
as the restoration of the sacrificial cult, and the revival of 
national autonomy involved in these legalistic schemes, the 
universal appeal of Judaism is revealed and announced. This 
universal element, not a colorless cosmopolitanism, but the dis- 
tinct and universally Jewish message, transmitted from the days 
of the prophet and psalmist through the Pharisees and rabbis 
of the Talmud, through rabbinical scholars, thinkers, poets, and 
thence down to us, is the platform on which American Jews 
chant their hymns of greeting to the universal God. 


7 Life of Max Lilienthal. 


AMERICAN JUDAISM 


A summary of those doctrinal concepts of Judaism acceptable 
to that group known as Reform Jews, to single out this fragment 
from among others, carries with it the assumption of a creed. 
But there is no dogma so firmly intrenched in Judaism as its 
creedlessness. This paradox proves the youthfulness of the Jew- 
ish religion which seems to be endowed with a sort of spiritual 
elixir and from age to age is renewed by drinking the waters 
of immortal life. The thirty-five centuries of unbroken historical 
continuity of the Jewish people is in reality not a miracle, albeit 
God, the watchman of Israel slumbereth not nor sleepeth, but 
indisputable evidence of the tremendous capacity for adjustment 
to a constantly varying environment. Ina brief survey therefore 
of the religious concepts which constitutes the Judaism, pro- 
fessed by a considerable number of the 3,500,000 Jews of the 
United States, the casual reader will be impressed by two facts: 
that Judaism admits of different interpretations and construc- 
tions; and that no phase of Judaism is a finality of the Jewish 
revelation. As liberty to be retained must be daily rewon, so 
does God daily renew the marvels of His creation. Not only 
each age and generation, but every individual names God in the 
vernacular of the period wherein he lives and has his being and 
also according to the stirring and yearnings of his own heart. 

An account of the religious content of Judaism in America 
labors under the difficulty of being views held by a group of 
Jews and secondly, even the personal views of an individual. 
As documentary proof of this, note that the thirteen articles of 
faith compiled by Moses Maimonides and included in his com- 
mentary on the Mishna. Later this was incorporated in the 
traditional liturgy of the daily morning service and recast in 
poetic version in the canticle “Yigdal.’”? Yet these postulates 
of belief were his own personal opinions and fiercely opposed by 
certain scholars of his own day, Abraham ben David of Pos- 
quieres for example. The personal equation is evident in pre- 
senting the religious construction of Judaism at any time in any 
part of the world. Those opinions and decisions entering into 


*Union Prayer Book, Part I, p 201. 
123 


124 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


the content of the religious construction of Judaism are not the 
resolutions of credal enactments of a synhedrial authority.’ 
There is no body of Jews—not even a Jewish Congress—with 
authority to impose its resolutions on any Jewish group. Surely 
not in the United States. 

This reservation must be borne in mind lest one infer that in 
the presentation of the religious outlook of one group, namely 
that of the American Jews of liberal inclinations and ante- 
cedents, the religious intent of all other Jewish groups in this 
country is registered. That is not the case. Every Jewish 
group—and there are many—cherishes its own version of the 
Jewish religion. There are to be sure certain fundamental views 
held in common by all, by virtue of which each one born in the 
household of Israel is ipso facto Jewish. These universal ele- 
ments will be detailed in proper sequence although a systematic 
order of presentation will not be rigorously followed lest it be 
presumed that Judaism is a rationalistic scheme capable of geo- 
metrical demonstration with major and minor premises that 
can be juggled like a syllogism. The elements that enter into 
Judaism will be treated in the order of their historical origin 
rather than in logical regimentation. 


In the first place Judaism does not sanction a differentiation 
of doctrine according to degrees of importance.’ The concept 
of God’s existence is no more important than His love and com- 
passion. God’s spirit in man vocalizes a belief not superior to 
the insistence that man is a free-will agent, endowed with 
genius to select either good or evil and whom God so loves that 
He endows him and all men with moral responsibility, thus mak- 
ing each one answerable for his own actions. 


?“An isolated saying, quoted in the Talmud in the name of an individual 
teacher, cannot be considered as Jewish religious teachings unless it is 
approved by the other teachers and accepted by the rabbis after Talmudic 
period and embodied in their codes.” Year Book, C.C.A.R., Vol. 31, p. 212. 


*“The fundamental principle of Judaism is, according to the rabbis, the 
doctrine that all men are brothers, children of one father and one mother, 
as stated in the opening chapters of the Torah.”...The second great prin- 
ciple of Judaism, which is but a logical sequence of the first, is declared 
to be the commandment (Lev. XIX, 18), “Thou shalt love thy fellow- 
man, not thy fellow-Jew only but thy fellow-man as thyself....Every 
human being—and not only the Jew—is beloved by God since he is a 
creature of God, made in His image, and therefore he should also be 
beloved by the Jew whose religious ideal is to imitate God and to love 
whom God loves.” Year Book, C.C.A.R., Vol. 31, p. 194. 


AMERICAN JUDAISM 125 


The qualities that enter into the content of the Jewish belief 
elude classification according to a scheme of salvation. Judaism 
is manifested by conduct. In so far as one dedicates himself to 
a life of worthiness he attests to the supremacy of his religious 
belief which exalts service to humanity above all other tokens 
of godliness. God begins and ends the Torah with illustrations 
of deeds of loving kindness, say the rabbis. God clothed the 
naked, they said, in Eden and buried Moses at the end of his 
career. This observation impresses in picturesque comment the 
sum-total of Judaism. 

For in a large and liberal sense Judaism is not merely a 
religion. It is a cause: the cause that works for righteousness. 
The Jewish people incarnate conscience. Israel is the heart of 
God.t The Jews have identified themselves with this service of 
righteousness as the distinct purpose of their existence. To them 
this world is not a figment of fancy, a whim and caprice of the 
cosmic process but providentially planned for the unfolding of 
a spirit, or a conscience, which reaching upwards strives to 
raise man out of lower depths of brutishness to human con- 
siderateness toward others.’ The Jewish people through their 
ceremonial and ritual have identified themselves with this service 
for humanity. Being among the first to voice it as the still small 
voice of conscience they continued to remain through the ages 
the prophetic harbinger and priestly guardian, “the witness,” 
unto consciousness which is a manifestation of deity. 

This consciousness of purpose was embodied in that historical 
group known as the Jews whose philosophy of history, early 
imparted in their national existence, by the ancient prophets and 
psalmists has remained the source of their persistency unto this 
day. While their message is universal, the messengers are 
earth-born, subject to the limitations of time and space, and all 
that is contained in such an admission, such as language, cere- 
monial, customs and institutions. 

The Jew therefore stands in a two-fold relation to the world: 
as a result of his endowment, he felt that he had a priestly 
world-mission. “In those days it shall come to pass that men 
should take hold, out of all languages of the nations, shall even 





‘This apostrophe has been attributed to Yehuda Halevi. 


5 Hosea, 2:18-25. 
® Olath Tamid, Eng. translation, p. 25 sqq. 


126 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying: we will go 
with you, for we have heard that God is with you.”’ And yet 
this world embracing vision was revealed through the language, 
institutions and human agencies of the Jews. Thus is set up 
an enigma that has been the source of a deep-seated hatred 
towards the Jewish people, first evinced in Alexandria and Rome, 
then later throughout all Christendom even to this very hour: 
Universal in outlook, National in origin. 

The contrasted world-mission of the Jews against the back- 
ground of the human instrumentalities of its manifestation and 
functioning, sets up no disunity nor does it foster a contradiction. 
Judaism is not for Jews alone. The law that goeth forth from 
Zion is to be heard eventually by all mankind as forevisioned in 
the afternoon service of the Day of Atonement.* The central 
conception of man created in the image of God applies to all 
humanity. “The son of man” is humanity written large. Thrilled 
by the consciousness that they have been called to bear the 
arc of the covenant, the children of Israel, though scattered far 
and wide, have impressed their religious ideals on the civilization 
of Europe and America. In the later days, so the poetry of the 
messianic vision anticipates, the mountain of the Lord’s house 
will be exalted above all the other hills and all mankind will be 
{ull of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the depth 
of the seas. 


There stands out then this consciousness of a distinct service 
to humanity.® This is embodied in the conception of the election 
of Israel, the servant of God, as the agency for the fulfillment of 
this function. There are certain signs set up in the poetry of 
this assignment such as the betrothal of Israel to God and the 
revelation of the Torah at Sinai, to impress upon each succeeding 
generation the solemnity of the dedication to a life of sacrifice 
and martyrdom. For Israel had to go forth to an unequal battle 
in a cause of unequalled importance. A handful, weak and ill- 
equipped had to take up arms against whole continents. In 
order to persist in his assault on selfish heathendom Israel for- 
tified himself with memorials, that is to say, ceremonials, whos¢ 
intent is to impress him with his Messianic destiny. Many oi 


™ Zechariah, 8:23, 
®*“Olath Tamid,”’ Eng. translation, p. 198 sqq. 
*The Jew teaches his religious principles by precept and example. 


AMERICAN JUDAISM 127 


the holidays observed in our period are memorials of this sancti- 
fication and dedication. The Sabbath in the larger application of 
the idea regnant therein, reverberates with echoes of lofty exal- 
tation of man. The ceremonials of Israel had a far different 
origin than that now associated with them. Many were survivals 
of a very primitive tribal rite shared by all aboriginal peoples 
and observed by all early races in all parts of the world. ?° But 
it is as true of these ceremonials as it is of other beliefs and 
concepts transmitted from tradition, all of the ceremonials have 
been reinvested with new contents.1* The ceremonial of Israel 
has gradually been built up from primitive foundations to lofty 
conceptions affecting the destiny of the human race. The per- 
manent value of a ceremonial is never lost since it contains an 
ethical ideal of brotherhood or the love of God for man. 

A slight familiarity with the origin of the festivals suffices to 
illustrate this process of development in Judaism. A _ purely 
agricultural feast which was a racial inheritance from prehistoric 
ancestry is appropriated by the rabbis of the Taimudic era, for 
instance, as the conveyors of a new vision of man’s destiny and 
particularly his conduct towards his fellow-man. Such festivals 
as Passover, Pentecost, Tabernacles, were primitive agricultural 
rites and reinvested with the spiritual content of liberty, loyalty 
and fraternity in later generations. The crass uses of amulets 
and talismen by the crude semitic tribes were popular in Canaan 
but were converted by the prophets into signs of Israel’s dedi- 
cation to a life of holiness instead of brutishness. The Day of 
Atonement originally a priestly ceremonial was transferred from 
the sanctuary of the Temple to the individual sanctuary in the 
soul of each one. Instead of a high priest atoning for the sins 
of all, each of his own volition sought expiation for his own sins 
and made himself personally responsible for his deeds and con- 
duct.?? 


 Folk-Lore and the Old Testament, by J. G. Frazer. 

™ The seventy bullocks which were offered in the Temple at Jerusalem 
on the Succoth festival were intended as an atonement for the seventy 
nations. Sukkah §56. 

*%“And on this so solemn day, we would search our hearts and examine 
our ways before Thee, and spurning what is of evil and confessing our 
sins, in deep contrition vow in Thy presence henceforth to walk in the 
light of Thy countenance. O forgive us, though our shortcomings be 
many and grievous, and cleanse us of our iniquities in the stream of Thy 
mercies; help Thou us so to live that the rest of our life hereafter may be 
pure and holy.” Olath Tamid, Eng. trans., p. 118. 


128 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


From this brief recital of the methods of recasting the 
inherited ceremonial of previous ages into the mould of modern 
forms one is justified in concluding that Judaism is subject to 
evolutionary growth. Being of the nature of an organism Juda- 
ism is constantly unfolding and developing. ** It is a religion of 
historical growth and is ever regenerated anew at each crisis in 
history. There is therefore no finality in Judaism. As it was in 
the beginning it is not so now. Its world is a world of improve- 
ability. Man is reborn. His nature can be and is changed. He 
reaches upward ever to the rock that is higher than himself. 

This recognition of a process of unfolding and renewal in 
content and phrasing of the great religious truths identified with 
Israel is the admission of a group in America who have accepted 
unwillingly the label of “Reform Jews” although a truer name 
would have been prophetic or liberal. The Reform Jew in con- 
trast to the orthodox Jew accepts evolution as a law of God. 
Liberal Jews accept the truths of ancient revelations as well 
as the visions ol the seers of our own time since God’s light is 
never hidden from any generation. 

Orthodox Judaism does not endorse this view. The idea of 
a gradual evolution of religious concepts is inhibited by reason 
of the rigorously binding doctrine of divine revelation. That 
is to say, the Torah, the moral law as it was given at Sinai is 
complete and unalterable for all ages. Liberal Jews insist that 
revelation is continuous. 


This difference of interpretation is the substance that separ- 
ates orthodox from Reform Jews and explains the readiness 
wherewith Liberal Jews have modernized the ceremonial of their 
synagogs here in the United States. 

Judaism in America is the immediate descendant of Reform 
Judaism which was originated in Germany and inspired the 
Jews of America to fashion the ritual of the synagog and their 
ceremonial in accordance with the spirit and atmosphere of the 
United States since the inherent purpose of the ceremonial and 
festival as traditionally interpreted, harmonized with the civic, 
political and national idealism of the United States. Any one 
of many alleged innovations of the American Jewish synagog, 
such as the ritual in the vernacular, family pews, Sunday services 


*% Tn his “Folk-Lore and the Old Testament” Frazer shows how exalted 
ideals grew out of primitive rites of all savage peoples. 


AMERICAN JUDAISM 129 


are buttressed by the recognition of the unfolding of the spirit 
of Judaism as illustrated in the growth of the ritual and religion 
from ancient to modern times. 

What is distinctly American in Judaism is the application of 
democracy inherent in Jewish tradition, to local situations. This 
does not involve a departure from Judaism but represents an 
extension of the links in its chain of tradition. A ceremonial 
more than a doctrinal variation has thus been effected. The 
essential elements of belief are untouched. Belief however is 
personal among Jewish people and is not stressed with the 
emphasis that is accorded conduct. In the Jewish consciousness 
belief per se can not be entertained. Belief dissociated from and 
unrelated to action has slight reverence in Jewish theology even 
if it be mystical. 

One must illustrate his belief by a life worthily spent.14* The 
Jew looks to action and conduct as the telling evidence of his 
faith. Hence he finds himself in fullest accord with the political 
institutions of the United States because his own religion first 
promulgated those ideals of equality, fraternity and liberty cor- 
porealized in the government of the United States. 

The democratic urge which evolved the institutions of this 
country transposing authority from one to all members of the 
group, was forevisioned by the prophets of Israel through whose 
influence high priest was divested of his sacred prerogative and 
his function delegated to the House of Jacob. The rise of the 
Pharisees illustrates the investment of the people of Judah with 
the sanctity hitherto assigned the priests alone. The substi- 
tution of prayer for sacrifice, the creation of the synagog as the 
house of prayer wherever ten or more men met in contrast to the 
temple where only the priestly order were privileged to fore- 
gather, indicated in remote antiquity that eventually democracy 
would be applied politically as it was being administered in 
religious ceremonial.1® Democracy is destined to be fulfilled in 
the realms of economics as Charles Steinmetz predicts for the 
world in the next century.’® 
~™ We must so profit life’s opportunities as to impress Thy spirit upon 
the things of earth within and without us, and shape them to the higher 


uses of the divinity, which Thou hast breathed upon our mortal clay.” 
Olath Tamid, p. 38. 

% “The Literature of Rabbinical and Mediaeval Judaism,” by Oesterley 
and Box, Part III., The Jewish Liturgy, p. 141 sqq. 

* The American Legion, Aug., 1923, 


130 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


The organization of the synagog in America recruiting mem- 
bership from among men and women and allowing women a 
voice in the administration of the synagog, exhibits the instinct 
of democracy which is one of the most pronounced tendencies 
in the Judaism of the diaspora. The continued application of a 
democratic technique to Jewish conceptions transmitted from 
old is all that American Judaism is or hopes to be. But this is 
much. Democracy is providing the Jews of America a new 
technique wherewith to register their religious reactions. The 
political primaries and election day is a holiday. Thus the funda- 
mental elements of political democracy are essentially Jewish 
since the discharge of all the duties of citizenship is a religious act. 

In Judaism and democracy the right to life, liberty and the 
pursuit of happiness are identical. Man fashioned in the image 
of God is endowed with life that he like Abraham may become 
a blessing. He is to live and not die that he may declare the 
mighty deeds of the Lord. In the poetic diction of Scripture, to 
do justly, to love mercy and to walk humbly with the Lord 
summarizes the fullest requirement exacted by God of mortal 
man. In essence the democracy of these United States intends 
to glorify the human being and humanity is the basis whereon 
Judaism rests. As American and as Jew, in discharging con- 
scientiously one’s duties as outlined by the prophet in terms of 
Justice, tempered by mercy and in reverence for our fellow 
men, these twain, Americanism and Judaism, become one as 
humanity and Judaism are synonymous. 

The doctrinal aspects of Judaism as expounded in this country 
retain the elements that compose the religious heritage of all 
Israel. This includes the monotheistic and monistic outlook on 
the world. No Jewish doctrine has been as firmly proclaimed 
as a belief in One and only God. The God idea in Judaism is 
not to be taken in the sense that there is a Supreme Being exist- 
ing in nature whose attributes can be discovered by metaphysical 
and scientific inquiry. According to the judgment of American 
Jews God is the impersonation of ethical ideas and is identified 
with His attributes. “With the merciful thou dost show Thy- 
self merciful; with the upright man thou dost show Thyself 
upright. With the pure thou dost show thyself pure and with 
the crooked Thou dost show Thyself subtle.’ 


17Psalm 18:26. 


AMERICAN JUDAISM 131 


Thus by conduct man illustrates the attributes he assigns God. 
In a sense man evolves God which means that what is evolved 
are His attributes. Be that as it may, God represents the ampli- 
tude of justice, and righteousness. All God’s ways are just. He 
is a God of truth. In His light do we see light. Whatsoever 
the yearning soul of man ascribes unto the Most High that sym- 
bolizes God to him. 


The watch word of Judaism is “Hear, O Israel, the Eternal 
is our God, the Eternal is One.” There are other renderings of 
this formula first phrased in Deuteronomy. As accepted today 
the formulization of faith refers not merely to the unity of God 
but the interdependent relation of all God’s creation. This 
monotheism is to be viewed from the standpoint of the far reach- 
ing importance effected by an acceptance of this interpretation 
of the world in contrast to a version held by paganism where- 
in many gods contended for obseisance. Originally that group 
who became Jews worshipped other gods. In course of time 
Judaism upheld the conception of a unified godhead and a unified 
world. Compare this conception with the heathen notion of a 
blind faith guiding the destiny of man and note that the out- 
come leads into the discard and rancor that is characteristic of 
heathendom. The unity of God includes the interdependence of 
all His Creation and all God’s creatures. Each human being, no 
matter what his previous condition may have been, shares with 
his fellow-man relationship to His Creator. The bond of union 
is one of divine inheritance. All men are mutually dependent. 
This is the distinct declaration of Judaism and while Jewish 
thinkers realize that all men are not equal in ability, all men 
are equally responsible to their duty. The Jewish genius sensed 
the dependence of man on his brother by reason of his concep- 
tion of God, the Creator. God is named Father and all earth’s 
creatures are His children, a tender-appellation but one that is 
saturated with the spirit of love which obtains among all who 
draw the breath of life. Thou shalt love thy fellow-men as thy 
self, states in brief the content of this belief.** 


The vital importance of these fundamental elements are 
attested in Jewish history. God is made known through his 
unfolding in history. In the mass apperception of the Jewish 


**In the Messianic era all men will live together in brotherly love. The 
task of Israel is to work for the realization of this ideal. 


132 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


people God is revealed in the attributes ascribed to Him: holi- 
ness, mercy, truth, those laws of morality that literally are the 
foundation of modern civilization. The God-consciousness*® 
of the Jews shaped their lives and spiritualized their material 
existence. They became missionaries in the cause that works 
for righteousness and in this service they established the love 
of truth, the pursuit of justice and the recognition of the sanctity 
of life and property as the symbol of a man’s worth and self- 
expression.” 

This kinship of God with man becomes in Judaism a covenant. 
A covenant therefore obtains between God and Israel. From 
age to age the terms of this covenant are reinterpreted. Often 
symbolically, always poetically it states the innate impulse of 
religion in man which is at heart a feeling of our going out 
towards something not ourselves, something greater than our- 
selves with which we are in communion. In some ways the 
religious sense is like the instinct of hunger, a hungering and 
a thirsting for righteousness, as the prophet phrased it. There 
is in the depth of our nature a vague longing for kinship with a 
spirit that fills the universe as the glory of the Lord filled the 
tabernacle. 

In this wise Israel feels drawn to God and expresses the 
indwelling of that consciousness of God in terms of endearment. 
“T have betrothed thee unto me in righteousness and in judgment 
and in loving kindness and in mercy. I will even betroth thee 
unto me in faithfulness and thou shalt know the Lord.”?? 

Religion expresses therefore a relationship with God. By 
means of it the yearning of earth-born creatures for identifica- 
tion with the Father, (a Supreme Being) is satisfied. Thus there 
is imparted to each human being an abiding value.”? This divine 
allegiance of mortal man with God enables man to transcend 
the limitations of earthly existence and become absorbed in an 
ampler creation which does not end with his earthly career and 
lends to all his activities a purpose and destiny that gives mean- 
ing to them. In Judaism this heritage of God bequeathed to man 
is the kingdom of righteousness to be eventually established. A 
poetic conception to be sure but without poetry religion is 


® Olath Tamid, p. 38. 

9 Singer’s Standard Prayer Book, p. 17. 
* Hosea 2:21-22. 

Union Prayer Book, p. 67. 


AMERICAN JUDAISM 133 


deprived of bridges to cross over from the garish reality of 
the known to the confidence in God’s love and wisdom estab- 
lished in the hope, faith and vision of man. 

When religion resorts to rationalism for an explanation men 
become skeptics and scoffers. Rationalism can not explain relig- 
ion as safely and sanely as poetry. Religion and poetry are of 
the heart, an emotional urge that man can no more escape than 
he can breathing and live. Religion is not an intellectual propo- 
sition to accept or reject. The doctrine of a sect or denomina- 
tion, a theological formulization of this primary urge within 
man can be put on or cast off but not the initial searching of the 
heart for that anchorage in the abiding value of God. Man is 
born into religion since it is a function of his being on the physic 
plane as hunger is on the physical. What man accepts or rejects 
are rationalizations told in terms of a denominational nomen- 
clature. These vary according to the different dialects man 
speaks in naming God. 

American Judaism has therefore been a doughty champion 
for religion and meets the challenge of rationalism valiantly. 
Religion, when held up to derision as a survival of man’s infancy 
is shown to be inherent and innate in man and can not be 
explained in terms of rationalism. 

It is experience shared by all humanity and is a natural pro- 
cess of the human being whereby he fortifies himself against 
the overwhelming contentions of the elements, his own weakness 

and frailty. Conscious that he is a child of dust and returns to 
the dust whence he came, a speck in the whirling spheres, the 
Jew does not yield to despair, but realizes his days are in God’s 
hands to help perfect the world. So the synagog of America 
announces, knowing full well that the Jew has no more mo- 
nopoly on religion than the Christian, the Mohammedan or Bud- 
dhist. Each one of the devotees of religion approaches his God 
according to the path of inspiration his group, in all aspects of 
their national, political, and economic existence, has hewn. The 
Jew interprets God in terms of those attributes assigned Him 
by Jewish tradition and consciousness.”* Other denominations 
and faiths praise their God in the vernacular of their local habi- 


* Judaism functions in action—dynamically. As will be shown, con- 
duct, character, behavior, ethical terms, identify and explain Judaism as 
doctrine and tradition explains the Jewish people. 


134 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


tation. In all of them each individual seeks to link himself in 
a chain that encompasses worlds without end. 

Born of Jewish parents a Jew is endowed as are his fellow- 
Jews with an inclination towards God, a predisposition to find 
out God. This searching, groaping and outreaching is common 
among all human beings, yet it must be clear that each histori- 
cal group explores territory familiar and follows paths already 
blazed. As each one of us steps upon the stage of existence, 
each brings into the drama antecedents and precedents, a heri- 
tage as it were, which is a culture. During the unfolding of the 
Jewish consciousness throughout history the Jewish people have 
incurred the penalty of obligation entailed by their ancestral 
culture and tradition. This obligation directly impinges on the 
conceptional relationship of a covenant between God and Israel. 
The poetry of the conception reacts in terms of moral and ethical 
conduct. His ideology of a co-partnership with God dictates 
the behavior that is most illustrative of this allegiance and if 
it be imputed to the Jew that he has set up a monstrous fiction 
in this visionary compact to beguile himself withal the Jew, 
loyal to his fealty, replies in terms of pragmatic philosophy. His 
religion, he avows, has armored him to withstand the outrageous 
assaults of ignorance, superstition, brutality and violence that 
has always been arrayed against him even at this very hour 
and which even in this United States has not abated. 

American Jews are not apologizing for Judaism. It is the firm 
conviction of the liberal group that their contribution to the 
American commonwealth is a service of morality. America is 
the richer for this inheritance of Israel, given to America no less 
in the lives of the Jewish people who illustrated their belief by 
their passion for humanity and their willingness to aid in what- 
ever endeavor blesses and benefits their fellow country-men, 
than in their tradition. Compounded as America is out of the 
various families of earth each of whom sought these shores that 
they might build a more perfect union the Jew is as needful as 
any group. In fact race is far less essential than spirit. To 
differentiate men on the score of their race and ignore the 
endowment of mind and heart is folly. No race is superior to 
another in the fulfillment of their duties. The biological status 
is generally discredited where it tries to prove racial superiority 
or inferiority. American Jews of the liberal school freely admit 
their Jewish ancestry. Fully aware of the fact that they sym- 


AMERICAN JUDAISM 135 


bolize the cause that makes for righteousness they mingle with 
their fellow-country men in common national duties. It is their 
vision of an ultimate destiny of humanity transcending the imper- 
fections of our own period that animates them. Men and women 
dedicated their lives to their country that their nation may be 
enlarged. Without vision a nation perishes. To stay the floods 
of passion, brutishness and the ever present menace of unmiti- 
gated selfishness they invoke the oracles of their Judaism. In 
the words of their prophetic ancestor they are told: 

Wash you, make you clean, 

Put away the evil of your doings 

From before Mine eyes, 

Cease to do evil; 

Learn to do well; 

Seek justice, relieve the oppressed, 


Judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.?4 
The American Jews acknowledge that other people share with 


them a religious consciousness, as has been intimated, and admit 
that this consciousness is manifested in terms of dogmas, cere- 
monials, and cultures. The attitude and value of these religions 
are often contrary, even antagonistic to the revelation of Juda- 
ism. Yet it is not the province of the Jew to deny these religions 
or seek by violence to banish them. The fact that a denomi- 
nation is organized to illustrate the teaching and preachment 
of its religious interpretation of the world justifies the movement 
since it spells the meaning of life to its devotees. The superi- 
ority or inferiority of religions hinges on the viewpoint of the 
individual measuring them. It is a matter of relativity. Jews 
are Jewish by reason of their birth in the household of Israel. 
Their measurement of religion is conditioned by that circum- 
stance and then again by the larger phenomena that Judaism 
is more to them than a mere religion. 

A Jew is born into Judaism. It is not a matter of meta- 
physical speculation that makes one accept Judaism. It is not 
a matter of mentality like logic or philosophy. It is a matter of 
common memories and like-mindedness shared by the group, 
events of joy, sorrow, tragedies, catastrophies. These and tra- 
ditional devotion to the cause of humanity evolve a Jewish 
soul, “The soul which Thou hast® given us came pure from 
Thee,” so begins a prayer now recited on the Sabbath morning 


* Tsaiah 1:16-17. 
Union Prayer Book, p. 65. 


136 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


service. This is poetry. The soul given us came from our fathers. 
We are their heirs physically and spiritually. Each of us is 
drawn to his own Jewish group by the magnet of the soul 
wherein is deposited all the emotion, enthusiasm, yearning, sor- 
row, triumph of his Jewish ancestors. Born into this group the 
Jew has imposed on him the memories and duties of the group. 

Thus it comes to pass that the Jew is by nature of his birth 
invested with Judaism. The Jewish life implies consciousness 
and entails duties as well as it imposes obligations. The equiva- 
lence of religions is not essential. Judaism to the Jew is a fun- 
damental condition of his thinking. He does not deny religion 
in others. His religion is his medium of identification whereby 
he finds himself and his place in the sun. It is his approach and 
contact with God, man and the world. Other peoples have theirs. 

Speculation on the equality of all religions is a skeptical 
inheritance of the French Encyclopedists who aimed to show 
as Voltaire did in his “Mohammed,” that all religions are 
impositions. A designing priest, it was claimed, intent on 
deceiving his fellows, invented some airy fabric of a theological 
dream and told of it in solemn tones to a spell-bound mob. Com- 
parative religions, combined with folk-lore and modern psychol- 
ogy, a far more reliable authority than the French cynic show 
that religion is not an adventure of crafty churchmen nor an 
invention of mountebanks but a function of the soul of man 
whereby one expresses one’s relation to something greater than 
one’s self.2® Religion is akin to language and art. It is an 
expression of the soul seeking to be incorporated in a Being, or 
a process, or a cause that is larger than self. 

This very kinship exacts obligations of individuals and in Juda- 
ism consciousness of this covenant entails a particular devotion. 
The religion of the American Jew is not merely a part of his life. 
It is the totality of his life. Existence is therefore no chaotic scheme 
of blind fate, no irresponsible indulgence of the senses and bodily 
appetites but an opportunity, enjoining discipline and control in 
order to unite with men in common collective efforts. 

The American Jew—(this is true, of course, of Jews every- 
where)—seeks to live an ethical life. An act of conduct becomes 
ethical when it is intercepted by judgment. The inhibition of 
impulse by judgment is constantly emphasized in Judaism. This 


”“The Function of Religion in Man’s Struggle for Existence,” by G. 
B. Foster, p. 176 sqq. 


AMERICAN JUDAISM 137 


is the basis of the ethical laws of the Pentateuch from the 
angle of psychology. It is the very gist of the Jewish inspira- 
tion. The attributes of God through whom each Jew knows 
God, becomes the bars flung across the path of heedless impulses 
that, unchecked, would plunge man into brutishness, unsociabil- 
ity, the collective term of which is, sin. 


Life directed ethically leads one to practices of justice, ser- 
vice and study on which the world rests. Orthodox Judaism 
would codify the totality of human behavior and regulate life 
according to that prescribed program revealed on Sinai. Ameri- 
can Judaism on the contrary emphasizes the ethical control of 
all conduct whether this conforms to the classifications of con- 
duct or deviates therefrom. 


In this construction of Judaism as an illustration of the ethi- 
cal process which Israel wrought and introduced to the world, 
American Judaism is absolved from Jewish nationalism. Polit- 
ical affiliation becomes then a means of manifesting the reaction 
of religious adhesion. The covenant set up between God and 
Israel utilizes political loyalty as a medium of expressing relig- 
ion. Voting, paying taxes, attending primaries—any phase of 
civic duty in government is a religious act, as “sacred” as any 
traditional rite such as reading from the Torah or observing 
Passover and eating unleavened bread. 


It can not be too often repeated that Judaism is not civic. 
It is supercivic, and is concerned with man’s relation to man 
in terms of humanity; not geography or nationality. America 
affords the Jew a means of exercising his religion in action and 
not theory, for practice not belief is Jewish procedure. The 
more conscious a Jew is of the ethical processes of his religion 
and the obligations ensuing from his birth in this group the bet- 
ter American he becomes. 


As Judaism comes to consciousness in different countries its 
ceremonial assumes some of the national features of the peoples 
among whom the Jews happen to dwell. These national charac- 
teristics—and there are several—(covering the heads of men 
during worship and the various taboos regarding women, their 
segregation in worship, for example)—are empirical and repre- 
sent no fundamental doctrinal view-point. This is decidedly 
true of American Judaism wherein national American ideals 
are complementary to the principles of Judaism. 





138 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


In common with all religions there is a tendency in Judaism 
towards abstraction. The externalizing of religious ideas 
requisitions ceremonials as the expression of those ideas. It is 
very true that ideas were not in their primary state abstractions 
and then symbolized in a ceremonial. Nor is the reverse true. 
Originally ceremonials were tribal institutions whose roots 
penetrate remote antiquity.?” In the guise of feats and holidays 
these ceremonials persist in the group consciousness which is 
constantly replenished. The abstraction precipitated by the 
mass association of the group from earliest semitic ancestry 
unto the present hour is now symbolized by an attribute where- 
with the Jews identify themselves with their God. Hence the 
festivals of the American Jews are not un-American nor evi- 
dences of disloyalty. The abstractions shadowing every Jewish 
festival is an ethical idea. In Passover, liberty; Shabuoth, 
consecration to a service of humanity; New Year’s, kinship with 
humanity; Yom Kippur, repentance and re-alignment with the 
group in the cause of God. 

These ideals applied in daily conduct here on earth, reinforce 
the structure of American democracy. The contribution that 
Judaism in America makes to the traditions of the House of 
Jacob is this application of Jewish ideas to the function of gov- 
ernment in this country. Government is only a part of life, a 
decreasing part at that. Political control tends more and more 
toward the economic functions and the seat of authority is 
shifting from the political group to the industrial, agricultural, 
the cultural and artistic groups. Even then the motivation will 
be generated by the central current of Jewish inspiration. 
Linking the individual with the creative process enables him 
to participate in the upbuilding of his own genius or working 
out of his desire or “daemon.’”?8 


*” Folk-Lore and the Old Testament, by J. G. Frazer, outlines many of 
these ceremonies as well as W. R. Smith in his “Religion of the Semites” 
and his “Kinship and Marriage Among the Arabs.” Both authors are fre- 
quently mentioned as representatives of the modern scientific method 
which displaced the traditional exegesis based on infallibility of original 
Scriptural text. 


* Judaism has ever recognized the unity of life, of action, of self. Hence 
to segment politics from economics and both from ethics, results in cor- 
ruption. Religion unifies and co-ordinates all functions of man. The 
function of religion is to assemble a series of incoherent, detached frag- 
ments and merge and fuse them into a tenacious whole or unit, which can 
be used for an ultimate good. 


AMERICAN JUDAISM 139 


In laying hold of the universal application of the ethical 
ideas by which God is symbolized and identified—to incar- 
nate Judaism in America—the Jews of this country have fol- 
lowed tradition which received the heritage of Reform Judaism 
and reinvested his construction of Judaism so as to harmonize 
with the political and social institutions of American civilization. 

Thus Reform Judaism has within a few decades organized a 
“minhag” or program wholly American. The acceptance on 
the part of many congregations of the Union Prayer Book 
affords a certain uniformity to the order of worship in Ameri- 
can Reform Congregations. This prayerbook, compiled by rabbis 
of reform training and inclinations eliminates entirely those 
references to a national restoration of the ancient patrimony and 
exalts the ethically universal in Judaism in contrast to the prim- 
itive and tribal. All references to Jerusalem, the holy city and 
the sacrificial system are deleted, as incompatible with citizen- 
ship in the United States. 

In many congregations throughout the country Friday even- 
ing has become of special importance. Services in some con- 
gregations are held on that evening only. As a rule a sermon 
is delivered in connection with the Friday evening service. But 
this contrivance is an exigency. It is also a subterfuge and often 
an evasion. The regular Saturday services of tradition are now 
attended by women and children for the most part. Reform rabbis 
have declared unfalteringly : “The Sabbath of tradition is dead.” 

Sunday morning has become the logical meeting hour for 
religious instruction. In many large congregations services on 
Sunday either supplementary or the sole meeting hour have be- 
come the regular program. 

Judaism in America is a fulfillment of Reform Judaism initi- 
ated in Germany. In the beginning Reform Judaism was a 
means of aestheticizing worship. It was concerned with deco- 
rum in the synagog in the main and gradually with a philosophy 
or theology. The American synagogs inherited this respect 
for the place and a reverence for the intent of the worshipper. 
It also respects the vernacular as it does the Semitic languages 
(Hebrew and Aramaic) in which even in modern rituals many 
venerable prayers are recited. But it does not impute any 
magical charm to these dialects. Certainly these traditional 
prayers are not incantations but sources of sentiment and 
emotion which play a definite part in conduct. Not the lan- 


140 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


guages, which are national, but the ideas are vital. Those ideas 
particularly of universal aspect are outdrawn and stressed. In 
this country the synagog presumes to be open on all sides as 
Abraham’s tent. It aims to be intelligent to whomsoever would 
hearken to the message announced. And it is the message of 
Judaism more than the rite, however inclined one be to empha- 
size the rite, that is the raison d’etre of Judaism. 

As our generation becomes more addicted to industrialism, 
the maladjustments and inequalities of the economic function 
become more apparent. An interpretation of Judaism is now 
sought to obtain a solution in this industrial warfare. In no way 
or walk is American Judaism more conspicuous than the reso- 
lution taken to function industrially as well as politically and 
socially. As a personal medium of piety Judaism does not 
exist. It is not a religion of salvation. Judaism serves the 
state through investing the individual Jew with desire and duties 
which he must contribute to the collective group.2® American 
Judaism has inherited the ideals of social justice and righteous- 
ness. These attributes of God which the Jew is to translate 
into action were first announced by his prophetic ancestors. To 
do them is the business of the Jew. His association with these 
ideals of social justice imposes the duty on him of making 
human life precious. This allegiance has made the Jew few and 
feeble in number to overcome the legions that rose up against 
him. Believing in his election as priest-people®® assured the 
Jew that he was chosen from among all mankind to teach man 
this law for life: namely, the love of justice, mercy, and peace. 
He has striven to do this. He tries himself to become like unto 
that which he taught. 

Now that the Jew lives in an industrial era it is thoroughly 
in keeping with American Judaism to make known these con- 
ceptions of modern industrial justice such as the right of labor 
to organize and to bargain collectively through representatives 
of its own choosing as an instrument by which to secure its 
rights at the hands of employers. Judaism recognizes the right 
of labor to share more equitably in determining the conditions 
In setting forth social salvation, justice, equality of opportunity, more 
adequate means of distribution, production for use not profit, and con- 
creting brotherhood of man in terms of economic liberation, Reform Juda- 
ism widens the chasm separating it from Christianity. 


This ideal is constantly rehearsed in the prayer books used in the 
United States, particularly “Olath Tamid” and Union Prayer Book. 


AMERICAN JUDAISM 141 


under which employees labor as well as in the reward of their 
working. 

Social justice is the corner-stone of Reform Judaism. Should 
not Judaism in America deal concretely with social industrial 
and economic problems of our own day when every phase of 
Judaism has been responsive to the cry of oppression? The 
answer is obvious. The legalism of rabbinic Judaism can not 
cope with the complex situations of this generation. The ethi- 
cal regeneration on which Judaism in America insists as the full- 
est and finest expression of the religious function applies primar- 
ily to those economic relations whereby men obtain their subsis- 
tence. Prophetic Judaism which is the rock from which all 
subsequent phases and forms are hewn, interprets all action in 
terms of ethics. American Judaism is a re-incarnation of pro- 
phetic Judaism. If Judaism in this country ceases to regard 
man and man’s dealings with his brother as the test of Judaism, 
it has outlived its usefulness and should be remorsely abandoned. 


To preserve Judaism as an asceticism is to mummify it and 
yet this tendency is evident in certain quarters. If Judaism is a 
religion of life as it is often described, how can it escape func- 
tioning in all circumstances of living, particularly in the eco- 
nomic domain, which is three-fourths of existence? American 
Judaism is oxygenic. It can not be neutral or passive or nitro- 
genic. It can not culture a pietistic emotionalism as a pana- 
cea for the religious shortcomings on the part of the individual. 
Judaism can not be distorted into a scheme to save one’s soul. 
The ambition of Judaism is to link the soul of each with God 
for the common, collective goal! Not self alone but to use one’s 
self for the social good, is the slogan of the synagog. 

There is tyranny abroad in the land to day. It is not the 
ancient tyranny of kings but all economic czarism! Political 
control has been usurped by economic domination. The author- 
ity of property seeks to enslave as mercilessly as monarchy 
ever dared and even more brutally. The Jew is an ancient 
rebel. His religion which is exercised through him, has been 
allied to a God who redeemed slaves from bondage and brought 
them forth to everlasting freedom. The redemption wrought 
in the days of old for his ancestors has become symbolic. To 
enslave men is to debase him and deny the God given right to 
realize the fullest expression of his creative spirit. Hence 
restriction of speech and the right of free assembly is un-Ameri- 


142 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


can as it is unconstitutional. More than all the right to life and 
happiness is primary.™ 

Industrial disputes arise. The invitation of certain rabbis 
to arbitrate these difficulties is a blessed augury. By their inter- 
vention more justice will be done than is possible now with 
violence and force mustered to suppress humanity. American 
Judaism urges a respect for the laws of the nation as our fathers 
revered the laws which Moses received from God at Sinai. That 
code of the laws respects neither the face of the poor nor rich.” 

American Judaism upholds the sanction of an eight-hour day. 
It favors a compulsory day of rest for all workers and the regu- 
lation of all industries so as to guarantee sanitary and safe 
conditions to the men and women who toil. It urges the aboli- 
tion of child labor and the raising of the age limit whenever the 
legal limit is too low to be consistent with moral and physical 
health. The enactment of legislation that will provide the work- 
ers with adequate compensation in cases of industrial accidents, 
occupational diseases, old age and unemployment is a definite, 
persistent demand in the preachment of American Judaism. 

The program of social justice only a few items of which have 
been stated and those pertaining to national situations but might 
include international relations: disarmament on land and sea; 
the recognition of small nations; the right of self-determination. 
These appeals are crystalizations of Jewish ethics. American 
Judaism is an interpretation of God in terms of the individual 
responsibility to the state, the nation, and the community of 
fellow-man. They reinterpret the Jewish revelation in terms of 
social justice and righteous industrial relations and thus witness 
anew to the providential purposes designed for Judaism in this 
world. For the old orders of individual contract and bargaining, 
product of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries must yield, 
giving way for collective action in which each lends himself 
for a larger goal, the welfare of the group instead of personal 
profit and selfish advantage. Hand in hand humanity now enters 
the gate-way of the future not single file like a tribe of American 
Indians. To the group not the individual belongs the future. 


* Social Justice Platform, C.C.A.R., 1920. 

“The “Law” as commonly understood in Judaism is not the highest 
attainment of the Jewish genius. The passion for justice, the love of man 
and the espousal of righteousness as his “way of life” presents more ade- 
quately the genuine nature of Judaism and the heart of the Jew. The 
codes in the Bible, the “Book of the Covenant,” the “Priestly Code” and 
“Deuteronomic” forevision the ethical zeal of Jewry throughout the ages. 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 


The two previous chapters may create in some the impression 
that this phenomenon, American Judaism, is a splendid imitation 
of the God of Israel on theoretical grounds but without substan- 
tial reality and application. If this be your American Judaism, 
one might be imagined saying where then are the concrete evi- 
dences of your religion? It has been stated with great emphasis 
that American Judaism is not a religion merely, but the entire 
life of the Jewish people dedicated to a cause, that cause being 
humanity’s welfare. In what manner then are these professions 
attested? Where are the fruits of the tree planted in the courts 
of the Lord? How are the deeds of loving-kindness which objec- 
tify the contention of your religion made manifest? 

The question is natural, but actually superfluous, since Juda- 
ism is known and illustrated in practice. It is not a matter of 
confession alone, but commission in ampler, fuller measure. 
Confession is essential. There must be a vision and conception 
of what is to be done by mortal man here on earth. Again and 
again one encounters this edict of the Lord: “This is the thing 
the Lord requires”! And then there are enumerated the deeds 
and action most acceptable unto Him whose will is obeyed. 
Belief does not figure so largely in the Jewish world as it does 
outside. Belief is personal. It is one’s conduct that is the 
basis of evidence in the court of the Most High. Jews were 
never excommunicated for the sake of belief alone. It was 
their conduct particularly such behavior as did violence to the 
conventions of the group that was provocative of official con- 
demnation. And this applies to Spinoza, whose excommunica- 
tion was not occasioned by his radicalism, his Biblical criticism, 
his postulate of a pantheistic God-concept, but his refusal to 
act according to the formulas of the group. Belief therefore 
does not constitute the totality of Judaism. Belief is not ignored 
but it is never presented as a creed to which one vows exclusive 
fealty.* 

2As an example of confession of faith, note the following prayer: “We 
confess this before Thee, O Eternal, that Thou art our God as Thou wast 


the God of our fathers. Thou wilt be forevermore. Thou are the Rock 
of our lives; the Shield of our salvation. Thou changest not though gen- 


143 


144 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


American Jews, alike with their brothers of the spirit the world 
over, are born into their Judaism. They do not join it nor accept 
it as an intellectual theorum or under emotional duress. The 
Jewish religion is not speculative and metaphysical so that an 
act of the mind or an impulse of emotion affirms it. One is 
born into the Jewish group. That group obligates conduct in 
conformity with the traditions of the group, and those traditions 
are cast in the mould of service towards humanity. To serve 
man is to worship God and hence to be Jewish.’ 

It is natural that American Judaism which is not a departure 
from the traditional urge of the Jewish religion should give 
fullest expression to this innate qualification. There is so evi- 
dent a craving to make practical and real the preachment and 
contention of this religious heritage that some zealous Jews in 
this country substitute philanthropy for religion, and assume 
that in clothing the naked, feeding the hungry, and setting the 
captives free, that is, in serving their humanity by bestowing 
charity, they describe every obligation of their Jewish religion 
without the intercession of the synagog and independent of it. 


erations come and go before Thee. We render thanks unto Thee and 
sing Thee praises. Our lives are in Thy hands and our souls in Thy 
keeping. Without number are Thy wonders which day after day Thou 
workest in our behalf. The boons which Thou marvelously showerest 
upon us at every hour and in all seasons are without end. Thou art a 
loving God, whose mercy and favors are boundless. Our hope hath ever 
been in Thee.” Olath Tamid, by D. Einhorn, p. 28, English translation. 

Judaism teaches and Jews practice the love of mankind. R. Simlai, a 
Jewish teacher of the Third century, said that David had reduced the 613 
ordinances of the Mishna to eleven, Isaiah to six, Micah to three and 
Habakkuk to one. David depicts the perfect man as one who walketh 
uprightly, worketh righteousness, speaketh truth in his heart, hath no 
slander on his tongue, doeth no evil to his neighbor, despises a vile per- 
son, honors them that fear the Lord, swears to his own hurt, changes 
not nor puts out his money to usury or takes a bribe against the innocent. 
These are the virtues catalogued in Psalm Fifteen. Isaiah draws a similar 
picture. The perfect man, according to his estimate, walketh righteously, 
speaketh uprightly, despiseth the gain of oppression, will not take bribes, 
stops his ears from hearing of blood and shuts his eyes from looking upon 
evil. (Is. 33:15.) Micah summarizes the ideal of Judaism in these im- 
mortal phrases: “What doth the Lord require of Thee, but to do justly, 
to love mercy and to walk reverently before God.” Habakkuk includes 
all these, so Rabbi Simlai quotes in the sentence: “The righteous shall 
live by his faith.” 

Ben Azzai declared that he for his part always regarded as of most 
vital importance as an exposition of the contention of Judaism, the verse 
in Genesis 5:1: “This is the book of the generation of Man.” 

* Social Creed of the Churches, C.C.A.R., Vol. 33, p. 241. 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 145 


The application of Judaism is instinctive.* This religion can 
not be portrayed as a creed or as articles of faith. Just as 
language precedes grammar, so the deeds of loving-kindness 
which constitute the application of Judaism precedes the abstrac- 
tion of theory and belief.4 In this wise, one should understand 
that the manifestations in the form of institutions, cultural 
agencies, philanthropies and ameliorative organizations fostered 
by American Jewry presents the trend and motivation of their 
religion. It is then meet for us to look into these as an evidence 
of what the Jewish citizen of this land have wrought in behalf 
of their own brethren and their fellow-citizens. For the Jew 
never builds for himself alone. Even his house of worship 
shall become the house of prayer for all peoples. So he invites 
all men of good will to share the peace and blessings of his 
endeavors and philanthropies. He raises no banner nor imposes 
any ban. For his world is the world of man, and his God is 
concerned in men here on this earth. 

In common with every revealed religion, Judaism in America 
has evolved certain view-points distinctively responsive to the 
American zeitgeist and the state of civilization prevailing here. 
These doctrines or interpretations of duty and tradition are not 
merely doctrines, as indicated, since the foundation of Judaism 
does not rest on doctrines alone. Essential as articles of belief are 
in the organization of life, their chief virtue consists in the stim- 
ulation these afford in directing one’s course of action. In so 
far as doctrines incite or precipitate action, the Jew believes 
and obeys them. But action is always involved and expected on 
the plane of humanity’s good. 

The rabbis explained this process in the following way: “As 
God is merciful and gracious, so be thou merciful and gracious. 
As God is called righteous, so be thou righteous. As God is 
holy, so do thou strive to be holy.” An imitation of God is held 
out as the pattern of behavior even as God is said to lay 
Tifellin.® 

Another rabbinical maxim is: “How can mortal man walk 
after God who is an all-consuming fire?” 

What the Bible means is this: “that man should emulate God. 


* Liberal Judaism and Social Service, by H. S. Lewis. 

“No philosophy or theology of Judaism was formulated until the Torah 
was given. i 

® Aboth de Rabbi Nathan. 


146 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


As he clothes the naked, nurses the sick, comforts the sorrowing 
and buries the dead, so should man.” 

The pattern of loving kindness is offered by God that man 
may copy it even as the study-habit is presented to man by the 
poetic conceit of God studying Torah. These beliefs are dis- 
charged whenever these ethical attributes are embodied in 
behavior. To declare them or confess them is futile unless ful- 
filled or discharged. The tenor of the confession uttered by the 
Jew is to the effect that God is the Rock of our lives and the 
shield of our salvation. “Thou changest not,’ reads this con- 
fession, “though generations come and go before Thee.’® <A 
statement, it will readily be perceived of a set of facts, an 
acknowledgment of God’s mercy and love. Confession is not 
sanctioned. Confession is not a synonym of belief but a program 
for action in Jewish thought. 

In order to facilitate the exercise of these duties and to prepare 
men for them, the synagog, which Dr. Kohler well calls “the 
most unique creation of Judaism,’ was evolved. “It was devised,” 
he says, “in the exile as a substitute for the Temple but it 
soon eclipsed the Temple as a religious force and rallying point 
for the whole people, appealing through prayer and scriptural 
lessons to the congregation as a whole. The synagog was 
limited to no one locality like the Temple but raised its walls 
wherever Jews settled throughout the globe.’ 

The democracy inherent in Judaism, divulged even in this 
remote post-exilic period, emancipated the Jewish people 
from imminent ecclesiasticism of the temple and the hierarchy 
of a priestly class. The synagog created by the uncoerced will 
of men and women acting in freedom, according to the interpre- 
tation of the Pharisees, symbolized that process of continuity 
and rejuvenation whereby Judaism persists, permitting the 
spiritual content to seek new forms and institutions as the Jewish 
people coming to this country wrought new institutions to 
express the religious beliefs they cherished.*® 

That this form of corporealization should be the synagog fol- 
lows as night does day. Religion and moral training have been 


* Note on p. 2. 

™“Tewish Theology,” p. 456. 

® The Pharisees and the rabbis of the Talmudic period were “reformers’ 
in the sense that they adjusted the law, which was Judaism to life and 
not life to the Law. See “The Pharisees,” by Herford. 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 147 


regarded by the Jewish people from the very beginning of their 
history as one of the chief objects of life. “And these words 
which I command thee this day shall be upon thy heart and 
thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children....’*®. This 
spiritual instruction was likewise continued by the Jews who set- 
tled here in accordance with tradition and after the pattern of 
their brethren of previous generations. All European countries 
where the Jews were located, no matter how unhappily, wit- 
nessed the establishment of the synagog to spread the truths of 
the Torah and at the same time to enkindle in the worshipper a 
love of God and humanity. ; 

No ecclesiastical warrant is required to establish a house of 
worship. It is a voluntary act, a free will offering on the part 
of Jews who happen to dwell in the same locality. No particu- 
lar site is required for a synagog unless it be a superstitious 
regard for the ruined wall of the Temple of old in Jerusalem, 
whose sole remaining fragment all synagogs of the diaspora are 
supposed to face, in anticipation of the time when the city of 
David shall be rebuilt, which as was shown in the previous 
chapters, was a large element of orthodoxy. 

The establishment of synagogs on this western continent was 
coterminous with the settlement of Jews in Brazil, 1638. The 
first synagog organized in this country was Shearith Israel of 
New York, a Spanish group who had located in a colony of the 
Netherlands. This congregation was formed in 1680, twenty- 
six years after the first Jewish colonists reached Manhattan 
Island° The minutes of the congregation tracing back as far 
as 1728 have been preserved. These are written in Spanish and 
English. Prior to the erection of a regular synagog services 
were held in a frame building in Mill Street, about a hundred 
feet, says the historian, east of the location whereon the con- 
gregation built its first synagog in 1729. 

The erection of this synagog is the pioneer venture of the 
spirit in America. Synagogs were subsequently started in every 
considerable Jewish settlement of that period which at the begin- 
ning of the Revolutionary war scarcely numbered more than 
2,500 for the entire Thirteen Original Colonies. Newport, R. 
I.; Lancaster, Pa.; Richmond, Savannah and Charleston con- 


° Deut. 6:4-10. 
 Markens, “The Hebrews in America,” p. 18 sqq. 


148 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


tinued the precedent that was followed by every Jewish settle- 
ment along the Atlantic Coast and later the middle and far 
West. Whenever there was a sufficient number to constitute 
a “minyan” in one locality, a burial society was formed. From 
this inception a synagog was germinated.*? 

But not all synagogs were propagated in this manner. Many 
reform congregations came into being as a result of cultural 
endeavors. A society formed for the express purpose of study- 
ing the literature and history of the Jews as revealed by the 
researches of scholarly rabbis developed later into a synagog. 
This is true of Sinai, Chicago, in particular. Scholarly men 
transferred their scientific training in philology—and compar- 
ative grammar to the responsa, commentaries, liturgical poetry, 
mysticism and rabbinical mediaeval literature. They were 
imbued with the ambition to found a Jewish science. These 
Reform Vereinen, composed of young men who had been 
“Religionslehrer”!? in Europe were reform congregations in 
embryo and though their constitutents had accepted new 
employments in this country, their interest in Jewish science 
did not flag. Some of them came together at intervals to study 
the works of Geiger, Philipson, Zunz and other modern Jewish 
scholars. In this wise they laid the foundation, spiritually, of 
reform temples. 

The urge of tradition prompts the Jew to erect a synagog. 
It is also a natural inclination for him to foregather with his 
brethren. As the country began to attract settlers, Jewish com- 
munities were formed. By the middle of the nineteenth century 
there were several cities along the Atlantic Coast and inland 
where sufficient number of Jews resided therein to erect a syna- 
gog. 

Among the membership of these congregations there was 
usually one who was able to act as a reader (cantor) since the 
service consisted in reciting the traditional prayers, for the 
rabbi, as understood today, one who reads the ritual and also 
preaches, was not among the early settlers. The ritual of the 
service in early days was the traditional collect. But with the 


4 Synagogs in S. W. of the United States are celebrating their semi- 
centennials, Dallas, Memphis, Golden Jubilee Rochester, B’nai Geshurum 
100th anniversary. 

*% This characterization applies in particular to Dr. Bernard Felsenthal of 
Chicago, Rabbi of Zion Congregation and a scholar of renown. 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 149 


advent of reform rabbis about the middle of the last century, 
such men as Max Lilienthal, Isaac Meyer Wise, David Einhorn, 
Samuel Adler and Samuel Hirsch, there was injected into the 
several congregations a liberal impulse which rejuvenated the 
organization and modernized them. The congregations resisting 
the new construction of Reform Judaism were few and these 
few were more obsessed by a veneration for Sephardic tradition 
than historical truth and democratic destiny. All synagogs were 
originally orthodox and became reform with conspicuous excep- 
tions. Mickve Israel, Philadelphia, and Shearith Israel, New 
York, are those exceptions. 

The complete adaptability of Reform Judaism to American 
democracy was evinced from the beginning of the reform move- 
ment in this country in 1824. Thus it was not chance nor 
caprice, but the logic of Jewish history that enabled the rabbis 
who located here in the middle of the nineteenth century to fit 
into this American environment with astonishing ease. The 
intent of Reform Judaism and the attitude and idealism of 
America mutually complemented and re-enforced one the other. 

In the case of the reform congregations the religious teacher 
as well as members were new-comers. Between rabbi and con- 
gregation there was no ecclesiastical barrier, neither then nor 
now. They are one and on an equality on the floor of the syna- 
gog and hence work together in harmony for the creation of a 
new heart, that is, an American attitude among their fellow 
members. This attitude was forced upon the attention of the 
pioneers as they realized that within a few years their children 
would succeed them. Their children, new products of this new 
land, would not follow European traditions in religion no more 
than they would in government or social relations. The con- 
sciousness of caste’* which is European and evident in all recent 
immigrants, was not manifested in these free-born children. 
This deduction focused attention on the imperative need for 
constructing Judaism along democratic lines, wherein man’s 
innate equality and his inalienable right to life and liberty are 
recognized. Since democracy was not antagonistic but com- 
patible with Judaism, the adjustment to the new situations in 
this country offered less difficulty than at first blush seemed 
apparent. 


* The inferiority-complex so evident in the psychology of the European 
born Jew is not so discernible here. 


150 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


Capable as the European rabbis proved to be, the fact that one 
was foreign-born or trained abroad and unfamiliar with the 
idiom of speech and out of sympathy with American institutions 
and culture, began to disqualify him as an instructor of chil- 
dren. Toward the close of the XIX century this circumstance, 
namely, rabbis learned and capable but out of harmony with 
democracy, had crystalized into a conviction that this country 
need not depend wholly on foreign trained rabbis. The spoken 
message of the older reform synagogs had been invariably 
delivered in the language understood best by the majority of 
members, and that was German. This practice, more or less 
modified in late years, and in some congregations entirely aban- 
doned at the end of the century, was officially abolished when 
the United States declared war against Germany, April 7, 1917. 
Speaking a dialect understood by parents but slightly known and 
disrespected by children, does not work for mutual good will 
and understanding. A chasm is at once effected which tends 
towards disunity of family life. Note the tragic clash prevail- 
ing today in all communities where stubborn orthodoxy refuses 
to relent for the sake of American born children, and clings to 
yiddish speech and ghetto habits without regard to the needs 
of this age. Whatever drift toward atheism, materialism, and 
irreligious socialism there is extant in Jewish circles can be 
traced in large measure from homes where parents defied modern 
American methods of religious instruction and the ministry of 
Reform Judaism.** 

The inevitable clash between father and son which is the 
travail of all progress is being reenacted in all Jewish homes in 
this country. Realizing that situation fully, the rabbis of the 
pioneer period concluded that the teachers of the Torah must 
be recruited from America and not imported from European 
seminaries in Germany, Austria, Hungary and even England, 
not to mention Russia. Theirs was a two-fold distrust. In the 
first place, the children of American Jews insisted on receiving 
instruction from the lips of one who spoke the vernacular with- 
out traces of foreign accent, which entailed far more serious 
consequences in the Jewish circles than French or Italian 
accentuation in non-Jewish circles. On the other hand, the 


“This border-land conflict of father and son is the background and often 
the thesis of modern Yiddish fiction and much of the fiction of Jewish 
novelists. 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 151 


members of the congregation began themselves to lose confi- 
dence in European standards, which had been represented as 
the purest brand of Judaism. 

There was gradually borne in on the consciousness of Ameri- 
can Jews that they were as capable of directing their own affairs 
spiritually without a clinging dependence on Europe as their 
fellow-citizens were in their sundry ways. Early in the nine- 
teenth century, an Englishman asked mockingly: “Who reads 
an American book?” In the same contemptuous strain any 
foreign educated Jew of that period might have been prompted 
to ask in derision: “Who receives instruction from an Ameri- 
can rabbi?” 

During the last quarter of the XIX century, this unfriendly 
mood had been largely dissipated. The need for creating semin- 
aries for rabbis was as apparent here as it had been to the rab- 
binical conference held in Breslau in 1856 when a scheme for 
the formation of a seminary wherein young men would be 
trained for German synagogs, was tentatively debated. At the 
close of the Civil War, and immediately thereafter, spasmodic 
attempts were made in this direction on the part of Temple 
Emanuel, New York. A similar effort was put forth in the 
establishment of the short-lived Maimonides College, Philadel- 
phia. The preparatory school opened by Emanuel for the Ameri- 
can rabbinate was later accepted into the Hebrew Union College 
and Maimonides, after a checquered career, became absorbed in 
the Jewish Theological Seminary, New York. None of these 
foundations had sufficient backing to endure the brunt of adverse 
criticism which usually entails a shrinkage of income and always 
freely proffered in Jewry. Viewed from the vantage of the present 
era, these schools were one-sided. American Jewry of that 
generation, it must be confessed, was not wholly prepared for 
a venture of this character, since there was no clientele with 
unanimity of ideas and ambitions for the perpetuation of Israel’s 
heritage, existing at that period. Yet these thwarted efforts 
were not wasted. They were experimental, the false structure 
used in building the bridge that spans the chasm. They enable 
later spirits “to arrive.” From these early initial movements 
towards establishing a rabbinical school, the successful federa- 
tion of several reform congregations organized for the purpose 
of providing an academy of learning for American Jewish youth 


152 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


became possible. This federating of Reform congregations 
became the Union of American Hebrew Congregations and a 
direct outcome of this league of synagogs called into being for 
the purpose of founding a rabbinical seminary lead to the found- 
ing of the Hebrew Union College at Cincinnati, in 1875, by a 
group of men cordially in sympathy with Dr. Isaac M. Wise, 
who perhaps more than any other personage of his generation 
urged the creation of a rabbinical academy, and possessed 
the organizing genius to create and realize it. 

Let it not be presumed that an academy of this sort is dis- 
tinctly American, however much we are prone to enhalo our- 
selves with the nimbus of chauvanistic glory. The European 
precedent is obvious in the traditional yeshiboth of Russia and 
the continent. Jewish tradition traces rabbinical academies 
back to Palestine and Babylon. The ancient academies of Susa 
and Pumbedeitha, while not identical with our modern Jewish 
seminaries, are the predecessors of all institutions that conserve 
the traditional scholarship of Jewry, the only inheritance the 
House of Jacob treasures. 

In the United States Jewish theological seminaries, are pro- 
fessional schools wherein young men are trained in the technique 
of the Jewish ministry.7* The older academies were given over 
to a discussion of the “Halakah” as was natural during the Tal- 
mudic era and the Middle Ages, when the assumption that Juda- 
ism was divine legislation was unassailed. No compulsion of 
this sort guided the destiny of the Hebrew Union College. One 
is safe in asserting that no academy of ancient days approached 
the ideal of democracy exhibited in the establishment of this 
college in regard to its curriculum which was modeled after the 
academic standards of European universities and in its method 
of subsistence. 

The means of obtaining its income and the source of main- 
tenance was and remains, even fifty years after its establishment, 
distinctly American. The founders under the assistance and 
direction of Dr. I. M. Wise, who was not alone and single-handed 
the instigator of the process as alleged by partisans, devised a 
federation of congregations. Whether directly or indirectly 
under the influence of Dr. Wise, who commanded an organizing 
and eminently constructive mind, which is latent among many, 


Intimate glimpses of the Rabbi’s Career by H. Berkowitz. 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 153 


yes, among the majority of Jews, the federation of congregations 
of reform proclivities and inclinations banded together into 
what was, out of deference to the country and in imitation 
thereof, styled, a “Union” as there was a union of commonwealths 
in the national constitution. These congregations were reform 
or variants thereof, and hence possessed at that time a homo- 
geneity which has not been experienced in the later decades of 
the past or present century. The congregations entering into 
this compact to establish a school of Jewish learning in America, 
combining traditional loyalty to scholarship and loyalty to the 
nation under whose beneficent sway they enjoyed the advan- 
tages of freedom and prosperity, were substantially like-minded, 
and being of one intent they assessed themselves pro rata to 
maintain this college. After considerable controversy, not all 
animated in a spirit of brotherly love, one must confess shame- 
facedly, the “union” was effectually consummated in 1873 at 
Cincinnati where representatives of thirty-four congregations all 
of whom were, as intimated, in sympathy with, if not avowed 
reform in ritual and interpretation. All were bent on establish- 
ing in this new land of liberty another seat of Jewish learning 
that under these western skies, learning, which increased peace 
in the world and liberty, their birthright, might not perish from 
among men. 

The outstanding objective of this federation of Union of 
American Hebrew Congregations was the establishment of this 
institution to conserve Jewish learning in the United States and 
to be a fountain head of inspiration, a replanting of the tree of 
life, which is the Torah, on this soil2¢ That this institution 
would become as the founders proposed, a seat of learning for 
students of Jewish literature, and thus be trained as teachers of 
congregations was the primary purpose. Inspiration alone and 
good intentions do not equip the religious teacher in Israel. He 
may be called by a voice from on High, but he is called to study. 
To teach he must first study and be learned in the law, that is 
the rabbi must be familiar with the tedious unfolding of the 
spirit of God as manifested in the career of the Jewish people 
in various times and places. 

In the autumn of 1875 the Hebrew Union College was opened 


*It is predicted that the United States will soon become the Jewish 
center for the world. 


154 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


to perpetuate the tradition and revelation of the Jewish genius 
as it has been unfolded in all historical ages and before. In its 
practical aspects the College aimed to prepare young men for 
rabbi or teacher in our American Jewish communities that were 
extending southward and west. The Talmudic adage, first learn 
then teach, is the formula followed by all Jewish seminaries, 
whether new or old: a rabbi must belong to that class of leaders 
whom Aristotle called “the men who know.” To instruct a gen- 
eration of American born children, reared in the free atmosphere 
of this continent, a Jewish teacher must be familiar with the 
lore of his fathers. A teacher of the Jewish religion, technically 
labelled rabbi, which is at best not a title but the designation of 
the function of teacher, endeavors to interpret modern situations 
from the standpoint of Jewish tradition and precedent and to 
fathom the attitudes and values of life and conduct from the 
Jewish outlook on God, man, and the World. In the thirty-five 
centuries of continuous historical existence, the Jewish people 
have entertained rationalistic as well as cabalistic, mystical, and 
pietistic, realistic and romantic versions and concepts. To know 
the content of Judaism one must know the stages of its organic 
development:—Old Testament, Apocryphal, Hellenistic, rab- 
binical, the rationalism of the Arabaic period and its influences, 
scholastic mediaevalism, the dominance of Aristotle and Platon- 
ism, as is evident in Ibn Gabirol, and neo-platonism.17 And 
the Christian platonists of the early centuries of our era, fore- 
runners of the Cabalists, tinctured the essence of Judaism 
with an esoteric aroma. These are the main branches of Juda- 
ism and involve considerable study to master even a part. 
The Hebrew Union College embraced in the main this cul- 
tural objective. A graduate therefrom or from the rabbinical 
department of the University of Chicago*® had obtained a cul- 
tural survey of the literature, history, ritual and philosophy 
evolved by the Jews throughout the ages. Its practical objec- 
tive was the preparation of young men for the profession of 
Jewish minister, the primary requirement of which is this survey 
of the development of the Jewish spirit throughout the ages 
and the application thereof to the situations and circumstances 


7 The Christian Platonists of Alexandria, by Charles Bigg, Lecture I. 

% The University of Chicago in the first years of its re-organization, 
had a full developed course in rabbinics, Jewish literature and philosophy, 
leading to a degree and as a preparation for the Jewish ministry. 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 155 


of American life and institutions. The ordination of the Jewish 
teacher is an ordination investing authority in the candidate to 
interpret competently the unfolding of this spirit of God, mani- 
fested in history. Ordination is not sacrasanct in Israel. The 
laying on of hands is symbolic of invested authority and com- 
petency transmitted from teacher to pupil by virtue of merit, 
not by the divine afflatus of inspiration. Strictly speaking, no 
rabbi is ordained. Rabbis are authorized to interpret the gradual 
development and organic growth of the spirit of God, the 
advances of man’s approach to God from the burning bush to 
the temple, not made by hands. In orthodox. Judaism the rabbi 
is a lawyer and is authorized by three other rabbis as competent 
to decide the “law.” 


When the college was established during the centennial period 
of our national existence there was little doubt among its officials 
and constituent congregations maintaining it financially and 
morally, that Judaism in this country would ever be open to any 
other construction than the historical and prophetic which is 
the outlook of Reform Judaism. It was assumed that Reform 
Judaism would be unmoved. The majority of congregations 
affiliated with the Union interpreted their destiny along ethical 
lines, and gave it a universal application, as Reform Judaism 
had inculcated. To them the Jew was a member of a priestly 
people, destined to be a “light” to all inhabitants of earth, and 
providentially appointed to lead all children of men in the path 
of life, which is the Biblical manner of describing the appoint- 
ment of the Jew as a teacher of humanity in all his relations, 
be these economic or political, social or industrial. For Judaism 
and humanity are synonymous terms. The college was to be 
fountain head of this conception of the historical role assigned 
the Jew in the drama of humanity. He is priest of social right- 
eousness, or if one prefers less technical nomenclature, he is the 
apostle of love, “the holy one in the midst of Thee,’ whom God 
alone knew among all the families of earth, and made him peda- 
gog unto the world; His witness to justice, love and truth. 

This world-encompassing version of Jewish destiny was the 
contention of Reform Judaism. When the Hebrew Union Col- 
lege was being organized this prevailing mode and version of 
Judaism reflected the religious view-point of a vast majority of 
Jewish congregations in America. The application for member- 


156 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


ship in the “Union” implied a recognition of this far-flung call 
of the Jew to be a servant of God unto humanity, which is a 
distinct note in American or Reform Judaism. 


Since the inception of the Hebrew Union College in 1875, 
conditions have changed. Reform congregations have gradually 
been outnumbered by orthodox organizations whose policy is 
a closer adherence to ritualistic ceremonialism of tradition. There 
is no disguising the fact on their part that they anchor their 
faith in the restoration of a nation primarily of Jews—the atti- 
tude abandoned by Reform Judaism fifty years ago—rather than 
to consecrate their lives to the establishment of social justice 
and righteousness among the children of men through their 
fellow-citizens. The anticipations of the followers of the Col- 
lege to raise up many in the ways of Reform Jews has not been 
realized. 

Reform Judaism had with reverent hand unlocked the 
treasure house of Jewish wisdom, as explained in previous chap- 
ters, selecting therefrom what was permanent from the accumu- 
lated accretions of centuries. The teachers of Reform Judaism 
claimed that in resting their case on these evidences of the Jew- 
ish spirit they were justified in abrogating the authority of 
Mishnah, Talmud and the Rabbinical Codes. As a matter of 
fact, Jewish science provided them with the authority to state 
that these codes, deductions from Biblical and later Mishnic 
laws, were in themselves evolved by emergencies and exigencies 
of the generation in which they were imposed, as patent as those 
in force in our own generation. The older Mosaic legislation 
from which all rabbinical laws evolved was the outgrowth of 
tribal taboos—as for example the Red Heifer.*° Orthodoxy 
pivoted the sanction of religion on divine revelation. Reform 
Judaism centered religion in the sanctity of collective conduct, 
approved by the group and fostered by Jewish tradition. 

The Hebrew Union College has not yet been convinced of 
its error in focusing the interpretation of Judaism on a plat- 
form of social righteousness instead of a national rebirth.2° The 
congregations comprising the Union which is the directing 
spirit of the institution, are firmly convinced of the truths 
revealed by the pioneers and preachers of Reform Judaism. 


” Numbers 19:2-22. 
7” Hebrew Union College Monthly, Oct. ’23. 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 157 


These accepted the ancient edict issued by God to Abraham, 
namely: “Be a blessing,” as binding on them today as on any 
other generation. 

The congregations affiliated with the Union may be in the 
minority but they are still persuaded that America, not Pales- 
tine, is their destiny, and their “city of God” is not Jerusalem, 
but their own home town. Furthermore what the God of Abra- 
ham, Isaac and Jacob requires of them is not to rebuild the 
ancient temple on its ancient Davidic site, nor restore the sacri- 
ficial system of the Aaronitic priest-hood, but to love their 
fellow-men, to deal justly with all men and be conscious of the 
obligation of service due their town, their trade or profession, 
their country. To give themselves to their humanity, in a word, 
and not to strive selfishly to get all one is able to amass, is 
the Jewish ideal. Judaism does not countenance individual 
exploitation, but upholds mutual aid and collective action for 
the enrichment of the commonwealth in the economic no less 
than in the political, industrial and social field. 

The Hebrew Union College began in a very modest way in 
the class rooms of Congregation B’nai Israel where, in the 
autumn of 1875, seventeen students were registered and began 
their rabbinical training. Twelve of these students were Ameri- 
can born. 

It is needless to trace the growth of the college, since this 
is well-known and typifies the expansion of our nation. In the 
early years of its existence, the faculty was limited to the 
President, Dr. I. M. Wise, and a few local rabbis. Soon Dr. 
Moses Mielziner became professor of Talmud; Dr. H. Zirndorf, 
professor of History; Rabbi S. Mannheimer, preceptor of 
Hebrew; Rabbi D. Davidson, assistant professor of Biblical 
literature; and Ephraim Feldman, assistant instructor in Tal- 
mud. These able men were the forerunners of other professors, 
like Deutch, Kohler, Neumark, Buttenwieser, Margolis, Eng- 
lander, Morgenstern, Mann, Freehof and others. Today, 1921, 
fourteen professors and special instructors constitute the teach- 
ing staff and two hundred and fifty rabbis have graduated there- 
from.”4 

Older European Jewries have the advantage of an established 








"The faculty, 1923, is even larger, and has now the largest teaching 
staff of any rabbinical school in the world. 


158 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


organization and the morale consequent to such conventionalized 
regimes. American Jewish communities were under the neces- 
sity of forming their morale, as well as to create the organiza- 
tions to sustain them. Naturally the Jew transferred to this 
country those religious and cultural organizations he had known 
and fully tested in the old world. Here he brought his synagog 
as has been explained, and also his religious school, where he 
transmits the culture, the ideals and aspirations indigenous with 
the Jewish group. In Europe the state supervised the religious 
education of the young, i. e. religious education was subsidized 
by subventions as a state function. Here religious education 
was a matter of private concern. To teach the words given to 
Israel to obey was the delight of the Jews for ages. It was 
therefore no new assignment for the Jewish people in America 
to open a religious school, but rather a pleasant duty which 
they proceeded to do from the beginning of their settlement 
here, bearing in mind that they were then and now few in 
number. In creating a seminary to prepare young men for the 
Jewish ministry, the intention was to raise up a generation of 
Jewish teachers, corresponding in culture and scholarship to 
the teachers of religion in Europe, and able to impart a knowl- 
edge of Bible, ethics, Jewish history, Jewish doctrines and 
semitics to the Jewish youth of America, as these great leaders 
of Jewish learning had imparted it in Europe. 


Teaching, in the full and proper sense of the term, is the 
business of the rabbi. If Judaism in America has accomplished 
anything it has to its credit two achievements: one is the eleva- 
tion of Jewish women to the dignity of American citizenship, 
which will be treated in the following chapter, and the other is 
the organization of Jewish religious schools and their ascent 
from the cellar to a separate building or an annex to the syna- 
gog. Jewish religious schools are no longer located in the cellars 
of the temple where they were at first installed, as a matter of 
economy in building, but occupy either adjacent or even separate 
buildings. 

The religious school is receiving an increasing amount of 
attention on the part of rabbis, parents and communal leaders. 
As education is an attainment prized by all America, so reform 
congregations, in turn, true to Jewish tradition, are zealous to 
spread the truths of Judaism to old and young. Paid teachers, 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 159 


instead of untrained volunteers whose good intentions often 
undo the good implanted, are now general for religious schools. 
An organized faculty, patterned after college and academy, a 
curriculum, with text-books, educational accessories, libraries, 
kindergarten classes, theatricals, boy and girl scouts, gymnas- 
ium, arts and crafts, dancing, music, and on Sabbath and _ holi- 
days services especially designed for children, are features of 
the modern Jewish religious school. Compare this rich and 
varied program with the meagre fare and intellectual aridity of 
the “cheder” of former days, or the Sunday School of the pioneer, 
and later decades. Surely Israel in America has marched 
forward. . 


With the establishment of the Union of American Hebrew 
Congregations a sentiment was crystalized in favor of communal 
or congregational activities. This desire to project the inspira- 
tion of the pulpit beyond the pews resulted in providing and 
promoting institutions and agencies of Jewish influence, purely 
American in operation, but not unknown or unique in Jewry. 
The American synagog and religious school, all forms of educa- 
tion in fact, even social service technically viewed,?? are dupli- 
cates in part of older institutions ministering at one time or 
another in Jewry. Even fraternal societies which have been 
developed in this country to an abnormal extent have roots in 
ancient days. Alexandria, Egypt, boasts priority of invention 
in this field.2* But in stimulating communal life among the 
Jews in the smaller cities, American Judaism begins to expand 
along distinctly American lines. 


This solicitude for the spiritual welfare of distant communi- 
ties crystalized in the formation of a Department of Synagog 
and School extension which aims to bring the word of the Torah 
to those children of Israel who heretofore had not enjoyed the 
educational privileges of organization and the spiritual benefit 
accruing therefrom in the shape of information, and particularly 
in the stimulation towards Jewish ideals and practices. 

The original intention of the Department of Synagog and 
School Extension was to approach smaller Jewish communities 
and encourage them to organize congregations, religious schools 
and communal activities. This department became officially 


7 Liberal Judaism and Social Service, by H. Lewis. 
* Jewish Life in Middle Ages, by Israel Abrahams, 


160 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


active in 1904 and instantly assumed the burden of reaching 
Jewish people scattered in isolated sections of the country. To 
these sermon pamphlets were mailed, also religious literature, 
text-books for instruction of children in the essential details of 
their religion and later a copy of the Union Bulletin®** and Home 
Study Magazine.” 

The establishment of congregations, i. e., synagog extension, 
was the original but not the sole function of this department. 
Other enterprises were soon added. This department discovered 
in course of time that there were groups of Jews who could not 
be organized into congregations as the officers and directors 
had planned. These groups were the students in universities 
and colleges; the inmates of penal and correctional institutions 
as well as those Jewish souls living in institutions for defectives. 

In the survey of national conditions which the Department of 
Synagog and School Extension undertook under the direction 
of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, the number 
of Jews unaffiliated with synagog or religious school, and thereby 
liable to atrophy their Jewish spirit from lack of contact with 
their brethren was appalling. There was, for example, a growing 
group of Jewish farmers which, in the last decade, has jumped 
from ten to thirty thousand. Their children were removed from 
Jewish centers and these were without enlightenment in the 
history, literature, religion and culture of the Jewish people. 
He who brings up a son without knowledge of a trade raises a 
brigand, is a Talmudic reflection, and he who does not teach 
his child a word of the Torah belongs to the generation of the 
golden calf. To stop a leakage of ignorance among Jewish 
farmers and residents of smaller towns, a Home Study Maga- 
zine was founded by the Department, the contents of which 
would provide information to children on Jewish religion and 
history, and likewise persons and ceremonies. To replenish the 
anointing oil of loyalty is the task of every generation. Under 
direction of this Department religious schools have been estab- 
lished in New York and Chicago.” 

Until the Department of Synagog and School Extension 
undertook to supply the daily press of the country with correct 


* Since abolished—June, 1923. 

* Now known as “Young Israel.” 

A training school for religious teachers in Jewish Sabbath Schools 
opened October, 1923, in New York. 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 161 


reports of Jewish holidays, the newspapers resorted largely to 
imagination, to characterize with extreme leniency the ridiculous 
information printed regarding our Jewish holidays. To style 
“Yom Kippur” the most sacred of holidays in the calendar of the 
synagog, “The Jewish Fourth of July,” was no uncommon occur- 
rence. To correct garbled statements which often brought the 
Jew into ridicule, the Department of Synagog and School Exten- 
sion, in conjunction with the Central Conference of American 
Rabbis, prepares for morning and evening newspapers of 
America a brief account of the religious holiday, its origin, 
intent and manner of celebration in both reform and orthodox 
congregations. Local details of the observance of the specific 
holiday are furnished by the resident rabbi, usually the rabbi 
of a congregation affiliated with the Union of American Hebrew 
Congregations. The ultimate purpose of these press notices, 
is to explode the inherited prejudices and misconception of the 
Jewish religion and exhibit the ethical idealism inherent and 
symbolized in the ceremony, and thus, by enlightening the pres- 
ent generation of American youths, create a better understanding 
among the future citizens of the United States of their fellow- 
Jewish countrymen. 

The Department of Synagog and School Extension is wholly 
American in conception and operation. It was projected to meet 
conditions peculiar to America, wherein a rapidly increasing 
urban population is counterbalanced by a widely scattered rural 
group. European peoples frequent pleasure resorts and health 
cures, for example. But our summer resort and vacation period 
is more specialized than in Europe. In the United States, religious 
services for these summer resorts and recreational places, was 
a venture undertaken by the Department of Synagog and School 
Extension in 1910. There has never been, one may venture to 
say, a similar attempt in Europe. By means of this plan, those 
resorts most frequented by Jewish guests are provided with 
religious services on the Sabbath. Rabbis summering there or 
in adjacent territory conduct the services and usually deliver 
a sermon. Service manuals and hymn books are supplied the 
usually large congregations attending these informal services 
conducted by the Department. 

The activities and enterprises of the Department of Synagog 
and School Extension are singularly native and were germinated 


162 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


on this soil to satisfy national needs. America is a country of 
gigantic proportions, That nowhere in this vast domain Jewish 
children might grow into manhood and womanhood uninfluenced 
by morality and the religious sanctions of the Jewish people, 
religious education has been provided in cities and towns, The 
Department has divided the country into several districts. A 
prominent rabbi of that district is appointed to supervise the 
departmental activity within his region. This includes colleges, 
institutions, the smaller communities and resorts. There is also 
an equally strong effort made—(perhaps stronger)—to enlist the 
rabbis of our largest cities to federate, as the Federation of 
Reform Congregations of Chicago, and the Minister’s Associ- 
ation of Greater New York, whose aim is to provide religious 
schools and American constructions and interpretations of Juda- 
ism for the vast Jewish population of these centers.?’ 


By these methods, namely; visiting smaller communities, 
organizing religious schools in larger centers, and providing for 
their religious and cultural aspirations, American Jewry, as 
symbolized in the “Union,” sees to it that no man, woman or 
child born into a Jewish household becomes estranged, in these 
United States, to the heritage of Israel. Whoever wishes may 
drink of the waters of Judaism and be refreshed, whether home- 
born or a stranger within the gates. As rain on a dry and arid 
waste, so are these various functions and enterprises of the 
Union of American Hebrew Congregations, and other varied cul- 
tural agencies instituted in colleges, universities, lodges and 
fraternal orders: they water the tree of Jewish life in this new 
Canaan of opportunity, that with the Jewish people, as with their 
fellow countrymen, liberty may never perish from the earth. 


But these various activities within the circle of congegational 
compass are not the only features of those activities inspired 
by American Judaism. The program of the “Union” has natur- 
ally invited imitators. The Hebrew Union College, the first 
and foremost still of its institutions, has now become the oldest 
among a number of academies of Jewish learning. The Jewish 
Theological Seminary of America, organized in 1886 and located 


**State federations of religious schools are being formed. The rabbis 
resident in Dist. No. 7, 1.0..B..B., meet annually two days previous to dis- 
trict conventions for a rabbinical conference. There are also State Con- 
ferences of Jewish Religious Schools in Alabama, Ohio, Arkansas, Okla- 
homa, etc. 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 163 


at 531 West 123rd Street, New York, is a close parallel to the 
older college. It was founded to perpetuate “traditional Juda- 
ism” instead of prophetic or American Judaism, and appeals to 
the recently Americanized Jew and his children who have 
retained residence along the Atlantic seaboard or remain under 
the influence of a nationalistic instead of prophetic, universal 
construction of Judaism. The Seminary is American in locale, 
but not outlook. The very purpose of its creation was to fos- 
ter “tradition,” not to harmonize with America and democracy. 
The dead hand of the past is not lifted from the institution, 
and it still holds in clutch all who enter therein, even to the 
extent of exacting rigid conformity to dietary laws abrogated by 
the American Conference of Rabbis is 1885. 

The Dropsie College for Hebrew and Cognate Learning, 
incorporated 1907 and located on Broad and Oak Streets, Phila- 
delphia, is a post-graduate school for advanced students in 
semitics and does not reflect any trace of American Judaism, 
since it is concerned with philology, not theology or philosophy. 

The Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, organized 
1896, located on Montgomery Street, New York City, is a 
Russian Yeshivah transplanted to the East Side of New York. 
It is an ultra orthodox, and wholly out of sympathy with 
American democracy, as one might infer, from the provisions 
of its foundation, namely: legalized Judaism. Naturally its 
faculty regards Reform Judaism as the next step to apostacy, 
since American Judaism abrogated rabbinism. This antedilu- 
vian seminary has been liberally endowed,?* but has no future 
here. 

The Jewish Institute of Religion, organized October 1, 1922, 
will be more in accord with American Judaism, it is likely, 
although this seminary is not pledged to interpret any phase of 
the Jewish religion as the official religious construction of this 
new rabbinical school. According to published statements bear- 
ing on policy and program of the institute, it is alleged that 
the seminary is to be “a school of training for the Jewish min- 
istry, research and community service.” The Jewish Institute 
promises to be a flowering of the Jewish spirit in America, and 
is destined to bear fruit in the next few decades, since it will 
enable the vast Jewish population along the Atlantic seaboard, 


*A “drive” for a fund of $5,000,000 has been launched by this institu- 
tion, 1923. 


164 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


the overwhelming majority of whom are without synagogal 
affiliations, to learn through American trained rabbis, the mes- 
sage of American Judaism. 

More distinctly American in the sense of fulfilling conditions 
projected by our native circumstances, is the National Farm 
School, incorporated April, 1896, and located in Bucks County, 
Pennsylvania. The primary intent of the Farm School is to 
prepare young men for the career of farmer, along modern 
scientific lines. It appeals to the imminent needs of Jewish 
boys and was founded for them, but is non-sectarian, and admits 
any boy who meets the simple requirements of admission. No 
scheme in the process of adjustment of the Jew to this country 
is so fundamental in conception as this school of husbandry. 
The founder, Rabbi Joseph Krauskopf of Philadelphia?® bore 
witness to the influence of Tolstoi in promoting it. The great 
Russian novelist claimed that the Jew would exterminate the 
virus of anti-semitism when in common with other peoples he 
returned to his ancestral calling—agriculture—and adds to the 
production of the common-wealth the fruit of his labor. To 
rewin the Jew to the soil from which he had been divorced for 
ages, is among the ambitions of the Farm School. After twenty- 
five years®® operation it has replaced scores of Jews on farms. 

The Farm School is American in locale, but no new venture 
in Israel. It has European precedents.*t Jewish farmers are 
not unknown in Russia** and throughout the continent. Yet 
it is setting an example in husbandry for the Jewish youth of 
America and providing an increasing number of Jewish boys with 
a career more in keeping ultimately with American destiny and 
Jewish tradition than any other adventure in commerce, art or 
the professions. There is gradually being created in these 
United States a group of Jewish farmers.*? The American 
Jewish farmer is no longer a stranger nor a curio in the Hudson 
Valley, Connecticut, the Catskill Mountains, New Jersey, 
Florida, the North West, Michigan, and California. There are 
yearly recruits to the ranks. ‘He who tills the soil shall have 
plenty to eat,” and yet man does not live by bread alone. From 


*® Died June, 1923. 

© Silver Jubilee celebrated June, 1923. 

™ Bernard Drachman’s “From the Heart of Israel.” 

* Jewish farmers are on the increase in Soviet Russia. 

“ Jewish Agricultural Society, organized Feb. 12, 1900. See Am. Jewish 
MiG Ks V Olid, Dr wer Os 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 165 


these sturdy burghers may arise the recruits of an American 
Judaism more distinctly democratic and responsive to the ideal- 
ism of America than has yet been developed. For men and 
women born on the soil of America can not become other than 
American in religion as well as in practice. Manual labor makes 
known the age-long ideal of the Jew, despite their detractors 
who claim the Jew is averse to labor. The Jewish farmer has 
golden prospects. To him belongs the future.*4 

The Jewish Chautauqua Society, organized 1893, Philadelphia, 
is an adaptation by Rabbi Henry Berkowitz, of the Chautauqua 
Literary and Scientific Circle, founded in the early eighties by 
Bishop John L. Vincent of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
and his associates, to supplement the old Methodists camp meet- 
ings so dear to the pioneers of early colonial history. The Jew- 
ish Chautauqua followed the formula of the older society and 
published text-books, organized “circles” and held summer and 
mid-winter conventions and still continues this policy, also aid- 
ing and supplementing the works of the rabbi and superintendent 
of religious schools. Its main attempt is to popularize Jewish 
literature in Jewish science and history among the young people 
and adults. The Jewish Chautauqua, like the Menorah Move- 
ment, is a cultural agency, American in method but ancient in 
intention and purpose. 

The tremendous growth of the Jewish newspapers in this 
country—there are 49 printed in English and one half that num- 
ber in Yiddish—covering every phase of Jewish activity and 
outlook, is not a distinguishing mark of Judaism in this country, 
but characteristic of the Jewish spirit everywhere. There is, 
therefore, no use to comment thereon. 

Nor are fraternal orders American in origin no matter what 
viewpoint held by the majority of members. The B’nai B’rith, 
founded in 1843, New York, is the prolific mother of innumer- 
able fraternal societies organized among Jews in all parts of 
this country. These are for the most part mutual benefit socie- 
ties which have prevailed among the Jewish people from earliest 

* The Jew is ultimately responsive to the soil. He becomes identified 
with the the earth he tills. American Jews are American politically, a 
closer identification will be effected when more Jews farm. The phase of 
Judaism these men will evolve (they are likely to register their reactions 
in agriculture as in all other professions) will be even more uniquely 


native and national than any interpretation thus evolved in the United 
States. 


166 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


period of their history. Continuing to function in this country 
these co-operative societies testify to the permanence of the 
human appeal that the Jewish religion makes to the Jew, and 
is an illustration of the truth he has ever tried to impress upon 
his humanity, that each one of the earth’s children is his 
brother’s keeper. 

The tendency to organize is strong in the Jew. With him, 
organization is a characteristic trait and is manifested in the 
formation of the Young Men’s Hebrew Associations and the 
Young Women’s Hebrew Association and kindred societies.* 
These associations are peculiar necessities of American commer- 
cial, civic and industrial life, and are planned to enable young 
people to exercise their gregarious instinct for association amid 
clean, dignified and helpful surroundings. These young people’s 
associations are a part of allied movements, such as the con- 
gregational brotherhoods, which will be examined in full, con- 
fined to synagog and congregation, junior congregations and 
the student congregations of colleges and Universities. The 
spirit of Judaism is permeating the atmosphere of these United 
States as of old the very air of Palestine was alleged to impart 
wisdom to those inhaling it. 

The present generation of American Jews, the majority of 
whom have grown up under reform influences, has no reason 
to shun or conceal their religious ancestry, nor do they. On the 
contrary, they are laying hold of it and letting Jewish traditions 
radiate its optimism and stimulate in them high design. This 
influence, operating through them, will lead many to realize the 
divinity implanted within them.” 


% Jewish Welfare Board amalgamated with Council of Y. M.H.A. and 
kindred associations, July 1, 1923, to promote the social welfare of sol- 
diers, sailors and marines in the service of the United States, and espe- 
cially to provide for the men of Jewish faith in the Army and Navy ade- 
quate opportunity for religious worship and hospitality of Jewish com- 
munities adjacent to military and naval posts. To stimulate the organ- 
ization of and to assist in the activities of Jewish centers, such as Y. M. 
H. A., Y. W. H. A. and kindred organizations, and to co-operate with all 
similar bodies in the development of Judaism and good citizenship, Am. 
Jie Bk, Viole 25, plt277- 

*® Other organizations are an outgrowth of the war, Jewish Valor Le- 
gion, Jewish War Veterans of America, The Federation of Oriental, of 
Polish-Hebrew and Ukranian Jews of America may each be said to be an 
outcome of the pogroms, distress, war devastation of their countrymen in 
Europe since each federation aims at relief work here and abroad, and 
whatever philanthropy is possible to their own group. 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 167 


The organization of a National Federation of Temple Brother- 
hoods, organized January 23, 1923, which represents the latest 
effort on the part of the Union of American Hebrew Congre- 
gations to organize special groups for the purpose of intensi- 
fying our religious life under the inspiration of the synagog, 
reveals in a somewhat startling manner the practical application 
of the preachment of Judaism to America. The springing up 
of these Men’s Clubs or Brotherhoods constitute a new feature 
in our American Jewish Communities, and illustrates how the 
spirit of social service in Judaism is responding to essentially 
American situations. This does not imply the superiority of 
our American Jewish organizations over those founded in 
Europe. There are innumerable organizations fostered by the 
Jewish youth of Europe.*? These are in the main self-defensive, 
mutually beneficial, aids and agencies concerned in assisting 
Jewish students in their tragic struggle to obtain a university 
education. The Brotherhood does not harbor a plan. It is 
detailed as an expression of the religious genius of Israel mani- 
fested on the part of the Jewish youth of America. In another 
age a society of this character might have been engrossed in 
problems purely rabbinical or academic, such as the Judeans, 
New York, or the Menorah societies now established at all our 
leading universities. The Menorah Society has its own organ, 
the “Menorah,” an excellent literary and scientific journal of 
Jewish art, culture, literature and history; and also conducts a 
summer school, 1923. 

The Brotherhoods, or societies of a similar character under 
different names, are composed of young men as a rule over 
twenty-one years of age. They meet if possible in the synagog, 
of which they are spiritual heirs, and these meetings, some- 
times fortnightly, more often monthly, are occasions when a 
luncheon is served, followed by an address from some well: 
recommended speaker or an evening’s entertainment of oratory 
and music. Sometimes either one or the other, but usually a happy 
combination of the serious and the gay, forms the program. 


In recent years college fraternities, Hai Resh, Kappa Nu, Alef Beth, etc., 
have been added to the association founded among various Jewish groups 
of men and women. For there are societies exclusively for Jewish wom- 


en, Hadassah, True Sisters, etc. 
The “Hakoach” of Vienna, an athletic team, has won many hard con- 


tested prizes in the arena and stadium. 


168 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


This in the most general terms is the present program of the 
Brotherhoods, allowing for variation of details in local instances 
and for modifications of method and manner. In the main the 
Brotherhoods endeavor to present to the young men of our 
modern Jewish congregations some of the outlines of culture, 
a survey of contemporary life in which all of the members are 
naturally engaged in their working hours. 

It is quite obvious that comparisons will be at once made 
between the Sisterhoods, as will be explained in the following 
chapter, and these newly-founded Brotherhoods. It will be 
charged against the Brotherhoods that they are duplications of 
kindred organizations existing in every considerable Jewish com- 
munity; that they consciously overlap on the Young Men’s 
Hebrew Association and inflict their members with needless 
burdens as a result of the ineradicable tendency of the Jewish 
genius to organize for every purpose under the sun. 

The stricture is superficial. On the surface the Brotherhoods 
are duplications of kindred young men’s societies, but these 
external resemblances are the only similarities the two societies 
manifest. And as far as the Sisterhoods are concerned, there 
is no endeavor to imitate or supplant, but a strong desire to 
emulate the splendid service these women of our modern Jewish 
congregations are rendering. 

The Sisterhoods, not to anticipate the content of the next 
chapter, by their very nature are adjuncts of the congregation 
In light of their origin they evolved from it. In the beginning 
they took over the work formerly monopolized by the men 
because modern business and industry prevented the men of the 
congregation from doing it themselves. Men had no time to 
lend themselves to the support of the Sabbath service, which 
would grow into disuse were it not for the pledges given by 
women to attend. In fact, it is no secret that many a congre- 
gation owes its organic being to the zeal of a few women whose 
Sisterhood furnished the inspiration for organizing, collecting 
money for a building, superintending the religious school and 
making possible the appointment of a resident rabbi. 

This program, only a small measure of the service rendered 
by the Sisterhoods, does not comprise the ambition of the 
Brotherhoods. They have another field. 


As a result of the adjustment of inherited ceremonial to mod- 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 169 


ern American situations, which is our special concern, particu- 
larly in the adjustment of Reform Judaism to American insti- 
tution, there was a danger that Judaism would become a religion 
merely, as has been intimated, instead of an all-encompassing 
cause, a destiny involving a philosophy of history which formu- 
lates certain laws of conduct and delegates the Jew to be the 
instrumentality of their fulfillment. There was imminent danger 
of this cleavage between religion and life. Judaism was in 
danger of being metamorphized into an aestheticism. It was 
becoming detached and objectified, thereby jeopardizing the 
very existence of Judaism, and hence caused some to declare 
with brazen effrontery that “Reform Judaism is a dire failure,” 
while others sought to counteract the “baneful influence of 
Reform Judaism” as indicated in the Introduction. 

But the reaction against isolating Judaism from life set in. 
This was evidenced by the attempt to found social centers in 
the community and supplement the more ceremonial features 
of the synagog by organizing classes of an educational, recrea- 
tional and social interest. 

These new adjuncts of congregational activity, combined with 
the enterprises sponsored by the women, restored the American 
reform synagog to its pristine function, that of the communal 
home, as well as the shrine or sanctuary of spiritual edification 
for the Jewish people, and through them for all humanity. 

In the programs of extra-synagogal activities that were being 
prepared, ample provision was made for the women, for the 
children, for the school youth, boy and girl, for boy scouts and 
girl scouts, for musicians, artists, amateur theatricals and stu- 
dents, but nothing had been provided for the young man, the 
business and professional men and artisans. No part of the 
synagog’s varied enterprises included special activities for young 
men whose attachment to the synagog is equally essential. 

There was added occasion to focus attention on the young 
men. They had need for a larger contact with life today than 
ever. Their business or profession did not afford them this 
opportunity of obtaining a survey of their environment. Special- 
ization in business and profession tended to astigmatize their 
view of life. They became as narrow as the confines of the 
office wherein they labored. And so they felt that they were 
cut off from their portion of social existence and unable to share 


170 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


in the amplitude of life. They wanted to know the interpreta- 
tions of the pulse beat and throb of modern industrialism; the 
intent or design of reactions as these manifestations, all sympto- 
matic of humanity’s present restlessness and disillusionment, 
intruded beyond the threshold of their consciousness. 

There were not exceptional instances. In the business world 
these young men might happen to be members or guests of 
societies whose meetings at the lunch hour are given over to 
a thoughtful consideration of the technique of business, and 
where, incidentally, capable men deliver a passing comment on 
world politics. 

Ii it was. well for business associates to confer in a serious 
mood over business and elevate it to the dignity of a profession, 
why could not one as a member of a Jewish community give 
himself over to the study of the problems that are now emerging 
as a result of his adjustment to these new national situations? 


What was necessary for a Jewish young man, as citizen and 
Jew, was the enlargement of his contacts with life. His religious 
inheritance had estranged him from the larger life of the com- 
munity through causes that were not of his own making. Here 
in America the very nature of democracy demanded as many 
contacts and intimacies with the affairs of his fellowmen as 
possible. He is a citizen of this country. He is in need of 
expressing himself and forming his political opinion. He is a 
resident of a city, a ward, a street, each of which entailed prob- 
lems that require him to form an opinion and make decisions. 

Beyond business and profession he is constantly enlisted for a 
service in which there is need of knowing intelligently the full 
meaning of the service he is to perform. To discharge these 
duties with a degree of efficiency it is proper and in accord with 
the tendency of the day to enlist the expert opinions of special- 
ists, scholars and statesmen. 

The social mingling of a group who are substantially like- 
minded and endowed with an identical spiritual heritage, which 
is, of course, one of the external features of the Brotherhoods, 
does not wholly justify its existence. Men meet frequently 
during business hours. The very exigencies of business impel 
men to meet and bargain. Business is fundamentally an exchange 
between persons. The social phase of the Brotherhood is derived 
from other sources, and this phase is not emphasized as the most 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 171 


conspicuous feature of the organization. At the same time it is 
not minimized, since men are gregarious and are ever devising 
means of enjoying one another’s company. 


The largest end the Brotherhood serves is the impetus pro- 
vided by the association of like-minded men and the means 
provided to increase their range of contacts with their political, 
industrial and economic environment and the frame-work of 
their own religion, that is to say, with the present-day world 
wherein they live and have their being. These contacts are 
necessary to liberate them and in turn make them sharers in 
the benefits of its modern life. 


Pee 


At last an agency has been created which enables the synagog 
to bring within its environs those who are from the market- 
place, the halls of Congress, the mill and factory and farm, and 
to hearken to their message. 


The Brotherhood is not restricted to a lyceum bureau. Com- 
mendable as is the effort to bring at stated periods eager-minded 
young men, who, seated at a banquet table or in an assembly, 
hearken to the words of experienced men and trained minds, 
there is another factor in the count: though we live in strenu- 
ous times, and the world is too much with us, there is an 
increase of leisure. Stores and offices close at sundown. At 
six o’clock the counting-room and market are deserted. There 
are at least three hours of undisputed leisure at eventide in 
which men and also women are at leisure to invite their souls 
or occupy themselves in study. To be sure, the nature of man 
is apathetic. The line of least resistance is one cast on lowest 
levels; hence most people make slight use of their leisure. 
Amusement is the most available channel sought, and amuse- 
ments claim the majority. But the few, the saving remnant, 
do not yield wholly to the importunities of amusements and 
pleasures. These few repair to meetings whose purpose is intel- 
lectual or cultural. From these are recruited the members of 
the Brotherhoods. This organization is thus detailed since it 
illustrates so completely the spirit of Judaism functioning in 
this new world of freedom and opportunity, 


As a cultural agency, mention must be made of the Jewish 


172 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


Publication Society,** organized June, 1888. It is an American 
organization patterned after a European institution. Societies 
of similar import were founded in Germany in the last century. 
The adaptation from abroad is by no means a reflection on the 
American Jews, but testimonies of their zeal and loyalty to the 
enterprise of the Jewish spirit in resuming amid new peoples and 
in a new country an ancient employment, namely, that of teach- 
ing man to know God, so that it will not become necessary for 
one to say to another “know God,” but they will all know Him 
from the greatest unto the least of them.* 


The philanthropy of American Jews has become in recent 
years their credentials for immortality.*° But the practice of 
charity, one of the pillars whereon the world rests, is not Ameri- 
can but a universal Jewish species of behavior. That American 
Jews have wrought more liberally in this than any other realm 
of the spirit and that some have elevated charity to the plane 


% The Publication Society has been distributing annually three books to 
each member. These books embrace a variety of subjects, including his- 
tory, travel, archaeology, literature, poetry, ceremonials, fiction for adults 
and children, translations, biographies, anthologies of post-biblical litera- 
ture, even philosophy and ethics have not been overlooked in this survey 
in part, of the field of Jewish literature and mentality. But the list is not 
complete nor have all fields and by-paths been explored. Books of tran- 
scending value and on subjects of supreme interest to the Jewish people 
might never have been printed had the Publication Society not provided 
means. This is true as regards the publication of the monumental achieve- 
ment of the Society, namely, the publication of the Old Testament which 
aims “to combine the spirit of Jewish tradition with the results of biblical 
scholarship, ancient, mediaeval and modern” (Preface, p. VII.) This is 
to be followed by the publication of a series of Jewish classics (one on Ibn 
Gabirol has appeared, 1923). For the past 25 years the J. P. S. of A. has 
distributed a year book, the first of its kind to be issued in this country, 
containing statistical material and a chronicle of events among other con- 
tributions. 


*® The Bureau of Research maintained by the American Jewish Commit- 
tee publishes monthly authentic information on matters of Jewish concern 
the world over. 


* As an illustration: The Independent Order, B’nai B’rith has in each 
of its seven districts, an orphanage, an old people’s institution. It has in 
Denver a national sanitarium for tubercular patients, the Leon N. Levi 
Memorial Hospital at Hot Springs, an anti-defamation league, a B’nai 
B’rith News and Jewish Messenger, organs of districts of the order. In 
lesser degree other Jewish fraternities maintain eleemosynary institutions 
corresponding to the groups constituting the order, that is, some are ortho- 
dox and like the Federation of Polish Hebrews, take care of those of their 
own group, although not excluding any worthy applicant of other national 
divisions. 


AMERICAN JEWISH INSTITUTIONS 173 


of a religion does not admit these deeds of loving kindness into 
the consideration of this chapter save to confirm the faith of 
those who have made real the words of Scripture: “The bless- 
ing of the Lord, it maketh rich and no sorrow is added 
thereto,’ 

The Jewish people of America have wrought mightily for 
America and to serve her they too have given and still do give, 
the last full measure of their devotion. 


“The united charity organizations in all large Jewish communities the 
country over, with paid officials and social workers, testifies to the elab- 
orateness of detail and organization whereby Jewish philanthropy in this 
country has been organized. There are social centers in all cities of any 
dimension, east and west and throughout the southern states. The poor 
among the children of Israel enjoy the fraternity of their brethren in afflic- 
tion. Sorrow never removed from the Jew has taught him to extend his 
hand to a fallen brother, be he old, sick or broken by adversity. Charity 
is one of the pillars on which the world stands. To practice “zedokah” 
(also meaning justice) is one of the cardinal doctrines of Judaism. Reform 
and orthodox Jews alike do deeds of charity as an intent and expression of 
their religion. So in America. It has been the age-long practice of Juda- 
ism. While wrought on larger scale and in larger measure here than else- 
where (fifty million dollars being raised for war rleief in East Europe alone) 
charity is not an American Jewish virtue, it is the virtue of the Jew every- 
where and at all times, also an emanation and declaration of his religion 
which designs and outlines the will of God revealed in the action of man 
toward his brother or in man’s love for his fellow man. 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 


It may sound rather antiquated at this late date, and in lieu 
of the Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution to speak of 
the “position” of women in general or the Jewish woman in 
particular. The emancipation, or legal enfranchisement of 
women in the United States, to use what the French call 
“cliches,” is so recent, one is prone to overlook the antecedent 
centuries when she was properly daubed by this technical term. 
Her accredited posture was conveyed by the word “position.” 
Her station in life was subordinate and she assumed an attitude 
of submission to authority imposed by men and exacted of her 
by them. She abided literally and figuratively in the shadow of 
her lord and master. No legal existence was assigned her. 
Unto her was ascribed neither mind nor will, property rights 
nor ownership. Until the end of the XIX Century, woman 
was not looked upon as an individual being. She was the female 
of the species. 

The condition of women throughout western civilization, in 
previous eras, and the situation still prevailing in oriental coun- 
tries, was also shared by the Jewish woman. The legal status 
assigned by her religion partook of the general attitude of the 
world regarding women as well as men. Both men and women 
were underlings to some authority invested with rights regarded 
as diviner or so unalterable that it cost one’s life to deny or 
oppose them. The demarcation between the position held by 
men and that of women is not so conspicuous: authority held 
both in leash. Men merely broke their bondage asunder a hun- 
dred years earlier than women. Men and women alike were 
supposed to be weak and humble, save that in the case of women, 
she, being the less robust and self-determined, was presumed 
to exhibit in more liberal measure her devotion to husband and 
children, as she had in turn been reverent to her parents and 
especially her father. It is very much after the fashion of the 
Pennsylvania Dutch of the present day. Among them husbands 
and fathers buy the clothing for their women; wives, daughters 
or sisters, and provide the household utensils and the furniture. 
Usually their own choice accords with their own yokelish tastes 


174 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 175 


and standards. Rarely do they consult the women, or heed their 
protests when some clout installs atrocities that violate all 
sense of refinement. 

There has been singular devotion in the Jewish household 
throughout the ages. This is due to the influence of Pharisaic 
Judaism in part, since the basic assumption of Pharisaism is the 
sanctification of life. The Pharisees set up the fiction of 
universal holiness. They transferred that sanctity, alleged to 
center in the temple, to the home. Their entire scheme of 
hallowing life sought to democratize religion and make each 
one responsible for his deeds. By attributing to the household 
and all its utilities, the table, one’s garments, and naturally the 
entire program of activities whereby men earn their daily bread, 
the same degree of sanctity attached to the temple, the priest- 
hood, and all the solemn pomp and circumstance of the sacri- 
ficial cult, they invested every household and all who dwelt 
therein with priestly glamor. 


This influence enlarged by rabbinism to embrace the totality 
of life—and by that elusive term is meant every function of the 
body without exception—the Jewish prayer book does not hesi- 
tate to include a prayer for evacuation’—and every phase and 
particle of action undergone by human beings in their daily 
round of work—endeavored to sanctify the whole of life. Hence 
the ceremonial of Judaism includes as frequently a “home-ser- 
vice” as it does a ritual for the synagog. The synagog was 
merely the communal home of a local group. This circumstance 
compelled men and women, husband and wife, parents and chil- 
dren, to do “team-work,” as we say these days, in their cere- 
monial. Drawn together by common rites as well as ties, there 
developed a spontaneous cooperative spirit which is in evidence 
everywhere when a certain group has been accustomed to do 
collectively a common task—witness, for instance the splendid 
“team-work” of the Welsh at their festive song contests. 

Another factor has entered into the singular attachment and 
traditional devotion regnant in the Jewish home; persecution. 
Jews have been drawn together because they have been driven 
together. The lash became a band, uniting those it flagellated. 
The Jewish woman, hand in hand with her husband, marched 


1Tewish Theology, by Kohler, p. 439; also Herford’s “Pharisaism.” 
*Singer’s Standard Prayer Book, p. 4, 


176 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


down the centuries convinced that all events and accidents 
befalling them in their checkered career is decreed on High, 
even if that be persecution, exile, martyrdom, and to obey His 
will the soul’s purest happiness. To be hounded across the con- 
tinent of Europe often assumed in their mind an edict from 
above. The Bath Kol or heavenly voice hymned in rabbinical 
lore sounded a summons unto men and caused them to suffer 
martyrdom that they might be the closer drawn together. Also 
did it engender a disposition to serenely fold their hands and 
wait the eventual triumph of God’s love that “they and all Israel 
may witness the establishment of His glorious dominion of 
righteousness among all the sons of men.”* One can not of a 
surety regard this attitude or temperament as fatalistic, although 
there is a substratum of fatalism in many Jewish people’s think- 
ing. A humble and a contrite heart is, however, more frequently 
met than avowed resignation or fatalistic submission. Our lives 
are in the hands of God is the reposeful consolation of many, 
hence it is not given man, much less woman, to know if the 
happenings and accidents that attend us on our daily pilgrimage 
are really for our own good. ‘The future is unrevealed. The 
secret things are God’s. Only what is known may the human 
being study and understand. Whatever befalls us, good fortune 
or bad, is intended for our good. It is a discipline exacted by 
God to control our action and guide us, neither unto arrogance 
and vanity nor into the valley of the shadow, but in the path 
of duty that each one may the better do his daily work. God 
orders all things well and has providentially allotted the task 
entailed in that sphere of service which belongs naturally to 
women. This is the aroma of their belief. 


Hence have the women of Israel cleaved unto God, confident 
that He guideth them in a straight path for His name’s sake. 

This consciousness of childlike and innocent dependency on 
God was paralleled by the conviction of dependence on her 
father, husband and even son, that is, on the man. Her defer- 
ence to God was not cringing but reverential and accepted with- 
out question or skeptical analysis. This attitude of humble 
tolerance of the conditions and circumstances of life was the 
divine plan installed on earth. There was no other alternative 
nor modus operandi. This world was created before her advent 


®FRinhorn’s Olath Tamid, Eng. translation, p. 33. 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS Vd 


and would abide after her departure. She was not consulted 
about it no more than her father consulted her in regard to 
the sort of husband she preferred. It was neither her duty to 
intrigue for a husband nor to express preferences. Nor did she 
register any complaint against this scheme because she never 
assumed there was another pattern of human existence. What 
is to be will be. Evidently it must be so, otherwise it would 
not happen, said she. Her duty was to discharge the tribal 
obligations of a daughter, the wifely functions of a helpmeet, 
the instinctive organic regulations of a mother without cynical 
sophistications, learned ratiocinations on the plausibility of the 
“as if” or the investiture of dreams in the Ivory Tower. 


This attitude of mind induced by rigorous adherence to 
authority (indirectly and unconsciously absorbed) such as Tal- 
mudism enthroned, characterized the average Jewish woman 
throughout the Middle-Age and into our own era. Yet it must 
not be inferred that this mental attitude was the particular 
dowery of women. Its dominion extended over the habitations 
of all Israel and held in the humble posture of supplication the 
full-grown sons of Israel as well as their married daughters. 
Her position was therefore a general state of mind, the mental 
attitude dominating the men as well as the women, save that 
Jewish women rebelled less and submitted more humbly to a 
power not herself which guided her destiny, than the men 
although they too were not obstreperous. 


Devotional literature for women written during the Middle- 
Age, and later,* reflects this clinging dependence on a higher 
power. As she might have been the clinging vine in her attitude 
towards her husband, so on a higher plane she assumed a like 
approach toward her Maker. He was often anthropomorphic in 
concept, yet this power was ever external, whose favor she must 
placate to succor her and in particular instances, shield and 
shelter her husband in his perilous adventures in the market or 
on the highway enroute to Fairs and Harvest Sales. She was 
swathed in this garment of pious dependence and bound by con- 
formity to ordinances and rites set forth in codes inaccessible to 
her as a rule, but inculcated by her superior. Her life was 


“In Year Book C.C.A.R., Vol. 33, Prof. S. B. Freehof’s article on this 
theme quotes some prayers written for women exhalting this attitude of 
conscious dependence. 


178 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


proscribed, regimented and ritualistic. Individuality as known 
in our day was not her portion. She neither sought it nor 
demanded it. To obey was to be pious and to be pious was the 
only way to win favor in the eyes of God and man, which was 
to encompass the end of all life. 


The new era has abrogated the authority of rabbinism and 
with it has evaporated the attitude of humble submissiveness 
which characterized the demeanor of Jewish women. The Jew- 
ess of our day incarnates the spirit of self-determination which 
invites individuality, personality and creativeness. A new per- 
sonage has come among the children of Israel; the daughter 
of Jacob who demands recognition at the portals of her father’s 
tabernacles and also admission into his hitherto exclusive halls. 
She is likewise a new product of this age, responsive to all its 
urge and tremors, its aspirations and misgivings. She, as much 
if not more than her brother, is glad that she is alive. For a 
world of holier splendor opens before her eyes, a world of beauty 
regained and now her own, because she forced stubborn, 
intractable man to yield to her importunities and concede her 
genius. As there is a new woman there is also a new Jewess, 
especially in America, albeit on the continent there are many 
wonderful Jewish women who in temper, achievement and 
scholarship rank with America’s rarest jewels. All of them no 
longer echo the clamor of Rachel who refused to be comforted. 
They are finding themselves, and in concert with their Ameri- 
can sister, glorying in their birthright. Here in the United 
States all these handmaids of God glory in the opportunity to 
serve in fuller measure their humanity. As it is here so it is 
abroad—England, Germany, Russia, Hungary, Austria, Holland, 
France and Poland. 


This American Jewess is a distinct creation of American Juda- 
ism. The enlargement of opportunities for service and partici- 
pation in communal and congregational activities, combined with 
privileges of a liberal college or high school education, has 
resulted in evolving the new type of Jewess, peculiarly respon- 
sive to the religious consciousness which received renewed 
stimulation in America. Women interpret their environment 
more readily than men; women also mirror more accurately the 
atmosphere of their age and the zeitgeist, and in the case of the 
Jewess share more liberally in its beneficences. What American 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 179 


Judaism purports is revealed in the manifold engagements of the 
American Jewish woman who contrasts with her mothers of 
blessed memory, not in zeal or consecration, but in the scope 
and compass of her modern employments and responsibilities 
in the large domain beyond the shadow of her hearth. 


Forces antedating the advent of suffrage which likewise 
released the Jewish woman of America, conspired to liberate 
her from the sex-taboos of ritual and tradition to which Jewish 
women, as conservators of hearth and home no less than the 
priestly altar fire, have been subjected during the long duration 
of Talmudism. The emancipation from the thralldom of ortho- 
doxy with its elaborate subjugation of woman!® inherited directly 
from the Orient and from primitive religious sex-taboos which 
the aboriginal Hebrews shared with all Semitic tribes® began in 
Germany by the reform rabbis of the middle-nineteenth century. 
The Breslau Conference of 1846 declared woman to be entitled 
to the same religious rights and subject to the same religious 
duties as man.’ 


According to this declaration, bold at that time, when views 
on the position of woman in society, business and the professions 
were far less liberal than our own, the Jewish woman must 
perform all duties toward children in the same measure as 
man,® and that neither husband nor father has the right to release 
from her vow, a daughter or a wife who has reached her religious 
majority. 

It was further resolved at this conference to abolish the bene- 


5“The weakness of the Synagog was its Orientalism,” says Kohler. 
(Jewish Theology, p. 470 sqq.) “And this Orientalism is especially marked 
in the attitude of the older synagog to woman. True enough, woman was 
honored as the mistress of the home. She kindled the Sabbath light, pro- 
vided for the joy and comfort of domestic life, especially on the holy 
days, observed strictly the laws of diet and purity, and awakened the spirit 
of piety in her children. Still she was excluded from the regular divine 
service in the synagog. She did not count as a member of the religious 
community which consisted exclusively of men.” She had no claim on any 
other wisdom than the distaff, according to R. Elieser (Yoma, 66b). As 
a result woman’s education as a rule was neglected. 

* Religion of the Semites, by W. Robertson Smith, p. 153 sqq. 

7™Philipson, “The Reform Movement,” p. 309 sqq. 

*“Aside from the sphere of Religion in which woman always manifests 
a splendid wealth of sentiment, she was held in subjection by Oriental 
laws in both marital and social relations, and her natural vocation as re- 
ligious teacher of children in the home failed to receive full recognition 
(opus cit.). 


180 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


diction which men recited to confirm them in the notion of their 
sex superiority: “Praised be thou, Lord, our God, who has 
not made me a woman.” In response to the social conventions, 
taboos and the religious MORES of the Orient, woman was 
assigned a benediction that sought to mollify her unhappy lot 
and reconcile her with fatalistic resignation to the inferior posi- 
tion: “Blessed are thou, O Lord, our God, who has made me 
according to Thy Will.” It is likely that the abandonment of 
these benedictions are indices of the trend of liberalism in Europe 
in the middle of the last century. About that period it was also 
resolved to obligate Jewish girls and women to participate in 
religious instruction and public service from youth up, and be 
counted for “minyan.” 


The stand taken by the Breslau Conference marked departures 
from orthodoxy which is oriental in many of its attitudes and 
ceremonials, not only toward women but towards men also, such 
as covering the head during worship. Modern investigations 
in folk lore and anthropology traced the primitive origin of 
many religious ceremonials back to tribal taboos.® Orthodoxy 
had preserved many of these taboos and these were especially 
pronounced in this attitude of orthodox Judaism toward women. 
While the Jewish woman was honored as the priestess of the 
family hearth and mistress of the home, her range of initiative 
ended there. She kindled the lights for the Sabbath and was 
commanded to obey strictly dietary laws and the ritualistic leg- 
islation on Levitical purity. It was her duty to cultivate a spirit 
of piety in her children and recognize her husband, father or 
brother as her superior.’° 


°Frazer’s Golden Bough and Robertson Smith, among many, showed 
that rites known to Jews and inherited by them from antiquity were not 
indigenous with Israel but Semitic, even universal, among primitive peo- 
ples. Take the dance for instance. Havelock Ellis in his “Dance of Life” 
illustrates the universal character of dancing as an expression of religion 
among the early peoples. Recognition of the universal character of rites 
lead Reform Rabbis to elevate Judaism from another basis, namely, from 
the standard of ethics. Ethics is the soul of the Jewish religion. 


* The practice of reciting prayers in private has never been abandoned 
in Israel. It was assiduously cultivated by Jewish women. There has 
been preserved in Jewish Literature many beautiful prayers composed by 
sages and seers. The technical term for this devotional literature is 
“Tehinnot”—books of private devotion. These have always been used 
in the Jewish home, particularly by the women. This paragraph from the 
MORNING PRAYER of Private Devotions, “Praise and Blessing,” is- 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 181 


Important as these duties were within the limits of their ful- 
fillment, the Jewish woman was excluded from regular divine 
services in the synagog. She did not count as a member of the 
religious community. The oriental world was strictly a man- 
made world and women were made to feel the force of their 
tyranny. When she attended synagog she was forced to sit 
apart, or in a gallery behind a trellis, during the service and 
could not even join the men in saying grace at table. The orien- 
tal attitude towards woman in both marital and social relations 
subjected her to humiliations that held her down for centuries. 


The first attempt to liberate the Jewish woman from the yoke 
of Orientalism was made in the Eleventh Century by Rabbi 
Gershon ben Jehudah of Mayence, Dr. K. Kohler informs us; 
under the influences of the civilization then current in Germany, 
he secured equal rights for men and women in marriage. But 
the fuller rights accorded her in the synagog of those congre- 
gations Americanized or tending to become modern, is due to 
the reform movement begun in Germany and Austria. Dr. M. 


sued by C.C.A.R. 1923, reproduces the tenor and atmosphere of the 
Tehinnot: 

“Heavenly Master, at the dawn of a new day, hear our voice. Thou art 
the source of our strength. Unless Thou build our house, in vain do we 
toil. Without Thy presence we lose faith in our strength, our courage ebbs 
and the slightest difficulties defeat us. Before the toil of the day begins 
we lay before Thee the meditations of our hearts. May they be accepta- 
ble in Thy sight. We commend the results of our labor unto Thy hands; 
may they be deemed worthy of Thine aid. Grant us, O divine source of 
strength, the power to toil patiently whether we succeed or fail, and to 
hope for Thy blessing. May this day bring us nearer to Thee.” (Praise 
and Blessing.) 

4A picture of the medieval Jewish woman is preserved for us in the 
autobiography of Gluckel von Hameln, a German diarist; born about 1646 
in Hamburg; died 1724 at Metz. She frequented the “heder” at Hamburg 
and was made acquainted with the Bible, as well as with German-Jewish 
literature of the time. When barely fourteen she was married to Hayyim 
Hameln and settled in the small town of Hameln. After a year the young 
couple moved to Hamburg and lived there at first in modest circumstances 
which by their industry was soon greatly improved. 

Gluckel had six sons and as many daughters whom she brought up very 
carefully and married to members of the best Jewish families in Ger- 
many. In 1689 her husband died and she was left with eight young chil- 
dren, four others being already married. Besides their education she had 
to direct the large business left by her husband, which she managed with 
great success. She had planned after she would have married off all her 
children to spend the remainder of her life in Palestine, but heavy losses 
in business changed her plans and at the age of fifty-four she married 
again and settled in Metz where after a number of adversities she passed 


182 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


Landsberg claims that the confirmation of boys and girls which 
was gradually introduced into the reform congregations abroad 
and its general practice by American reform congregations is 
the virtual recognition of women as an equal of man in synagog 
and school. 


Upon the initiative of Isaac M. Wise, family pews were intro- 
duced in the American Synagog at Albany, N. Y., in 1851, in 
the synagog of which he was rabbi, and the Jewish woman was 
seated beside her husband, son, father and brother as their equal 
in participating in the service. This and another advance, a 
choir composed of boys and girls, was marked in the gradual 
enlargement of her scope and range. Realms long locked against 
her were now finally opened.?? 


The Reform Movement is therefore credited with this achieve- 
ment: removing the inhibitions against the Jewish woman and 
replacing her subjugation with responsibility in Jewish com- 


the last years of her life occupied in writing her memoirs. These were 
edited by D. Kaufmann, Frankfort-on-the-Main, 1896, and consist of seven 
books written in Judaeo-German interspersed with Hebrew, in which 
she relates her own varied experiences and many important events of the 
time. She often adds homiletic and moral stories taken partly from Mid- 
rash and Talmud, partly from Judaeo-German books, and evinces in her 
autobiography wide reading and also disclosing valuable information about 
the life of German Jews. Jew. En., Vol. VI, p. 197. 

Sombart in his “The Jews and Modern Capitalism,” drags 
in the memoirs of Gluckel of Hameln to prove the commercial aspects of 
Jewish piety because she is always praying for rich husbands for her 
daughters. “If this were conclusive,” comments Joseph Jacobs in his 
“Jewish Contributions to Civilization” (p. 263), ‘the whole of 
the French nobility with their marriages de convenience would 
be convicted of the same commercialism.” She was a good business 
woman and as well as a deeply pious soul showing the greatest confidence 
in the will of her Heavenly Father. That she wishes her children well is 
the natural yearning of any mother, Jew or Christian. Sembart illustra- 
tion of an exhibit of the animus of higher anti-semetics who rely on half 
truths, understatements and perverted dedications of moron logic to sus- 
tain them in their prejudices. 

* Family pews was an important reform, the first of its kind in the 
United States, although in the Reform Congregations of Germany the 
women’s gallery no longer existed, men and women occupied separate 
pews. This innovation was soon adopted by all Jewish Reform and many 
conservative congregations in this country. This important step was 
severely condemned. Heretofore the Jewish woman had been treated 
almost as a stranger in the synagog and had been excluded from all par- 
ticipation in congregational life—Max B. May’s Biography of I. M. Wise, 
p. 122 sqq. 


EE 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 183 


munal life.** Some fear the synagog threatens to become effem- 
inate due to the feministic movement of the age.1* “American 
society. is a cynocratic caste, a woman controlled Caste,” says 
Elsie Clews Parsons, the noted sociologist, “and there is a danger 
that the synagog which in ages past was the exclusive property 
of men be handed over to women entirely. The trustees of all 
congregations now agree that the support and co-operation of 
the Jewish women of a community is the breath of life of the 
organization.”*5 

After the Civil War, congregational activities in America 
began to be delegated to women. Previous to that era, the com- 
munal affairs: burying the dead, providing for the indigent, edu- 
cating the new comer and stimulating patriotic service when 
not indirectly incited in the synagog, was taken in charge by 
the B’nai B’rith, incorporated in 1843. The age-long obligation 
of men to discharge their communal duties was thereby recog- 
nized. By means of the ladies’ aid societies, the philanthropic 
activities of the community were transferred to the women. 
Formerly the distribution of charity was in the hands of men, 
because considered a man’s work. Usually cases of distress 
were reported in the synagog. The service hour was never so 
formal as to exclude reference to actual cases of want. The 
refugee and immigrant, in all historical periods, sought the 
synagog as a haven of safety. The stranger wended his way to 
the Beth Hamidrash sure to be welcomed and often indeed 
invited to be a Sabbath guest.1* These amenities of personal 
service are now relegated to paid functionaries. Social welfare 
workers, charity agents, instead of individual members of con- 
gregations. The solidarity of Israel which prevailed during the 
diaspora has been broken up in the United States as rabid nation- 
alism has disintegrated it in Europe, and Jewish people manifest 
their religious kinship in less personal terms than in former 


18Tt goes without saying that the Jewish woman of today has the same 
interests as her sister of non-Jewish birth and belief. It is her unques- 
tionable right to aspire after larger culture and profounder knowledge. 
“Ibsen, Shaw, Nietzsche or Bergson and James should not be sealed books 
and unfamiliar prophets to her.’”’ Reform Advocate, Nov. 28, 1914. 

4 Op. Cit. “Feministic Movement in the Synagog,” March 10, 1915. 

% Life of I. M. Wise, opus cit., p. 122 sqa. 

%In Zangwill’s “King of Schnorrers” this practice is ingeniously ex- 
ploited by the King of Schnorrers. Jewish slaves were also ransomed 
at that time. 


184 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


generations. Still such measures as the acceptance of war 
orphans and raising war relief funds of gigantic proportions for 
devastated European Jewries exhibits the “Jewish heart” in 
this generation so enamored of gold. When these good deeds 
were personally practiced, charity cases were investigated by 
men and administered by them. In America this practical work 
of applied religion has been transmitted to women to a very 
large degree. 

The growing importance of these women’s societies was recog- 
nized by the men responsible for the upkeep of the synagogs. 
They realized that their women folks were administering the 
practical affairs of the congregations and attending to its func- 
tioning with eminent satisfaction. The limited leisure of men 
drawn into the economic whirlpool, compelled Jewish women 
through their aid societies to attend to the cases of distress 
occasioned by the shifting population of industrialism, immi- 
gration, financial depression, sickness, and downright ignorance. 
Formerly to perform a service of helpfulness in case of distress 
was regarded as a ‘mitzvoth’?* and cheerfully accepted by men 
as well as women, but modern industrialism has other goals 
than mere benevolence. It certainly does not permit all to dis- 
charge their duties towards the poor and needy directly. Charity 
is now vicariously administered. The women at first undertook 
the labor, and by assuming this burden they gained admission 
later into the director’s room of the synagog. 


Corresponding to this transfer of responsibility for communal 
welfare from men to women, in which it now became the recog- 
nized duty of women to probe conditions prevailing in the homes 
of the poor, the dispossessed, infesting the crowded tenements 
of all congested districts in our cities, is the recognition accorded 
women to acquire knowledge. It is in these days axiomatic 
that women enter the ranks and become active workers in such 
welfare endeavors that rescue young lives from the snares of 
commercialized vice and prevent others from falling into the 
cesspool of crime and degradation. That it is commonplace now 
overlooks the long era wherein her duty began and ended where 
many reactionaries among us today would confine it—to ma- 
ternity and the home. When the Jewish women, by means of 


“ Literally, a commandment. By implication, doing a deed of loving 
kindness. 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 185 


their larger contact, began to learn of the activities undertaken 
in the churches of their neighbors, they, too, demanded dupli- 
cation of these cultural processes within their own religious shel- 
ter. Under the roof of the Unitarian and churches of other 
denominations there were reading circles organized exclusively 
for women and by them to study the best that had been thought 
and said among the master minds. Programs were arranged in 
the liberal churches with which the Jewish women came in 
closer contact than others, that were laden with courses of lec- 
tures and suggested reading in various branches of the arts. 
There was no valid reason for closing the doors of the synagog 
to classes of a similar character organized within the groups 
composing our modern synagogs. The Jewish women felt that 
they too could pay understanding heed to literature and art, and 
began to devise means for the attainment of those ends sought 
in classes and circles that would familiarize such as had no 
literary culture with the messages and historic content of great 
poets, playwrights, romancers, artists of western civilization. 
Impulses of this nature came to a head during the World’s 
Fair Year, 1893, and crystallized in the formation of a Council 
of Jewish Women which endeavored to transfer to the Jewess 
the same inspiration and motivation that flourished among her 
American neighbors. Circumstances made it advisable, or at 
least unavoidable, that Jewish women should form their own 
circles, even if a few of their number are prominent workers in 
the larger clubs of their fellow-women. The Jewish women 
responsible in a larger measure for the formation of the council 
were religious offspring of Reform Jewish congregations. Born 
and reared in the Middle-west as happened to be the case with 
the organizers, they were directly moulded by the liberalizing 
preachment of prophetic Judaism as it was preached by the rab- 
bis of Chicago, especially Dr. E. G. Hirsch, who unfolded the 
destiny of Judaism in terms of service to humanity and not in. 
the idiom of a national restoration to Palestine. Stressing the 
function of religion as that contribution of each individual to the 
social well-being of all, instead of the mere fulfillment of tradi- 
tional rites, the Jewish women of the American synagog were 
the first to be rejuvenated by the elixir of this new inspiration. 
The opportunities for participating in the cultural movements 
and a study of the arts and literature of the new world was their 
goal. But, linked to this ambition, was the desire to know the 


186 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


sources of Judaism and the literature that had spiritually nour- 
ished their ancestors and kept them alive in famine. The sources 
the Jewish women had tapped in previous eras when they sought 
to educate themselves were brackish. Either it was Yosippon 
or the Sen Harenna, possibly the Siddur**, two volumes in 
German-Jewish, one pseudo-historical, the other maudlin senti- 
mentality. But the vast domain of Jewish literature which Kar- 
peles, its historian, says is distinct in that it has embraced a 
period of 3,000 years and has absorbed the spiritual unfolding of 
all humanity, was sealed to them. A few Talmudists among 
women are recorded in the Middle Age who did learn to know 
and understand on the same level of intimacy as men. But learn- 
ing was never the crown of woman’s adornment in former ages 
as it was the supreme attainment of men, wherein the value and 
social prestige attending learning and the learned was supreme. 
Orthodox Judaism did not require it. But Judaism in America 
stimulated Jewish women to emulate their neighbors and realize 
their own values, too, of their own accord and account. 


The Council set forth to provide facilities for self-culture in 
the field of Jewish history, literature and theology. For the Jew- 
ish women of America, women being by nature the conservators, 
the Council claims to stand for “the preservation of Judaism,” 
which is of course a vague challenge to their visionary opponents 
who might deny this. Jewish men stand for the preservation of 
Judaism, too, without asking for a definition of terms. The coun- 
cil aims to “arouse an interest for things Jewish,” and urges 
individual members to acquire a knowledge of Judaism and 
information on Jewish subjects. 

“Every council member,” so reads a clause in a report on their 
committee of religion, 1917-20, “should feel it her duty to give 
evidence of her belief in her religion by attendance at public 
worship, by maintenance of religious ceremonies in her home, 
especially for the Sabbath and holidays and by encouraging her 
children to attend religious school so that they learn to appreci- 
ate and love the God of their fathers.” To facilitate study classes, 
the Council outlines a syllabus for various circles, including the 
Bible, Jewish history, Jewish literature, and Jewish ceremonial 
objects and institutions. 


1° The praver-book had been translated into German-Jewish, i. e., Yid- 
dish, especially for women whose piety was deepened by reading there- 
from on Sabbath afternoons. 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 187 


The work of the Council is not confind to study circles. The 
original design of the organization has been enlarged and vari- 
ous committees now conduct large undertakings. 

Under the aegis of its seal, faith and humanity, education, 
civics, philanthropy and religion, the Council has been safe- 
guarded. Through sub-committees, civic and communal affairs 
are supervised from the angle of Jewish concern. Education, 
which is in its initial and primary stages the peculiar task of 
women, receives their unflagging support. Peace and arbitration 
in the adjustment of national issues again is the allotted province 
of women, which her emancipation now permits to control or 
direct, if she so wishes it. And there are an increasing number 
of women who are not swayed by the vociferations of military 
men and the pomposities of statesmen, flattering them with 
spurious gallantries, so as to win the support of women for 
alleged invasions of fictitious armies whose fantastic aggressions 
must be suppressed by the slaughter of the sons and perhaps 
daughters of the women. Jewish women are more than ever 
being enrolled for peace and arbitration. 

Surveying the field of their endeavors, one is impressed by the 
sincerity of their undertaking, their evident zeal to serve their 
humanity, and above all their recognition of the motivation as 
Jewish in incentive and origin. They have imbibed freely from 
the well springs of Jewish traditions and precedents. Their 
Jewish consciousness, the inheritance of generations of God fear- 
ing, devoted mothers, who sought to win favor in the eyes of 
God and man by rendering unto their fellows the service of love 
and mercy which their modern daughters render unto this gener- 
ation, is now repeated that the children of this genera- 
tion, and the children of their neighbors may grow up in the 
love and fear of God, which is a Biblical phrase, for what we 
describe as benevolence. 

The Jewish women of the present day are better equipped to 
disarm greed, lust and oppression than their mothers. Susan B. 
Anthony once said that government was “civic-housekeeping,” 
and there is much wisdom in her shrewd comment. Government 
wholly dependent on men will not be apt to stay the ravages of 
sickness, war and famine, the three furies, which the Jewish 
women have been learned to dread as the scourges a merciful God 
should avert. As a thrifty provident housewife (whom adula- 
tion has personified as typical of the Jewish mother) keeps 


188 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


sweet and clean her own domicile, so the women of the nation 
are applying their domesticity instinct, or proclivity, to the 
nation, state and city. It has always been desired. But only in 
this age could the Jewish women appoint as they do, a Jewish 
woman physician to head a committee on public health and a 
press woman to intercede for the purity of the press. The 
Blind, Deaf and Tubercular, Social welfare and Legislation now 
engage her (and since the war, Foreign Relations and Recon- 
struction) and, crowning all, her diligence to foster religion and 
through the religious schools spread the incentive of noble 
endeavor according to Jewish practices and example. Lest she 
forget her sisters who now, in larger number, are locating on 
farms, the Council has created a special standing committee to 
look after Jewish women on farms and to provide them some of 
the occasion and opportunity to link up with the enlarging coun- 
cil of their fellow sisters. In fact, the Council can justly boast of 
being the only organization of Jewish women offering assistance 
in formulating plans for every branch of social activity. In 
educational, philanthropic and civic endeavor, they are inter- 
nationally famous. The Council has members or is able to place 
its representatives in every large civic enterprise in the United 
States. The committees on Reconstruction and Foreign Rela- 
tions (of great consequence to Jewish people since many of them 
have relatives in the Old World) keep in touch with every 
organization of Jewish women in Europe. The Council has to 
its merit the founding of organizations safeguarding Jewish 
women abroad, and introducing to the societies thus formed an 
American standard of social work. The Council is recognized 
by the Federal government as qualified to care for Jewish 
immigrant women and girls at the ports of entry on the Atlantic 
and Pacific coast. This record of achievements and ambition 
testifies too eloquently, and without further comment, that to the 
Jewish women now, as of old, humanity gives the fruit of her 
hands and lets her works praise her in the gates. 


The Council within a few years began to fit the daughter of 
Israel to do her best for the state as citizen and fellow-country- 
woman. In the earlier years of the Council many of the mem- 
bers shared with their fellow club women of other denomina- 
tions the hardship of the campaign to popularize the suffrage 
movement. It was natural that the activities of the Council 
be restricted to those endeavors in which women excel, namely: 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 189 


philanthropy. The women strove to familiarize themselves with 
the principles and practical devices of the social workers, since 
they felt that it was their right to care for the Jewish women, 
the immigrant Jewish girl, and surround the newcomer with 
all the safeguards that foresight and sisterly devotion could 
devise. 

It is possible that at that time there were some among the 
Council who deplored the necessity of segregation along his- 
torical lines, that is the organization of a body of Jewish women 
given over to the purposes that occupied them which were a 
duplicate in part of those undertakings in culture and philan- 
thropy undertaken in other denominations. It was agreed that, 
(deplorable as it was), the attitude of mankind was still inhos- 
pitable to that cosmopolitanism necessary for wide fellowship. 
Groups such as Jewish women had reason to gather among 
themselves to learn in the first place their particular genius and 
ambition, that is, the distinct part which it is here as a Jewess 
to play, a role which she can not hope to act unless she has 
read the confessions of the Jewish soul as this is treasured in 
Jewish literature. This record and witness of Jewish life and 
ideals was not accessible to her. To translate these ideas and 
ideals, these Jewish confidences and hopes, into her own speech 
and action was now imperative. 

There were boundless opportunities for cultural studies in 
literature, art, or whatever phase of civic or political life women 
espoused. Cooperation was likewise sought in movements of 
social reform. But circumstances, the outcome of antecedent 
historical events, as well as anti-semitism, made it advisable, 
or at least unavoidable for Jewish women to form their own 
circle, even if in women’s clubs of national prominence, women 
were not brought together by church or ethnic national affinities, 
as the Jewish women. The Jewish Council was open, they said, 
to every Jewish woman: Orthodox or Reform, conservative 
or liberal, Zionist or non-Zionist, American or foreign born. 
Their ambition to study and keep abreast of the times in civic, 
cultural, religious and national affairs could no more be sup- 
pressed than it is impossible for the ocean tides to cease heaving. 
Jewish women are too intelligent. They had been too long 
suppressed in the synagog. Their alleged inferiority, however, 
was restricted to the synagog only. Their worth was recog- 
nized in the home, to be sure, but even in larger fields. In 


190 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


commercial ways, they had often been burden-bearer and bread 
winners?® while their husbands were sequestered in Beth Hami- 
drash. Too great a yearning for an ampler and freer participa- 
tion in the conduct of affairs has been engendered for Jewish 
women to ignore this clamor of their fellow American sisters. 
Their neighbors belonged to clubs and societies intent on 
developing an appreciation for literature, drama, music, so that 
with characteristic intensity and whole-heartedness the Ameri- 
can Jewess entered the wide flung gates of culture. 

The Council is now rejoicing in thirty years uninterrupted 
labors. It is a pardonable pride, and yet all the while there has 
been certain efforts put forth within congregations of a philan- 
thropic character. These intra-synagogal societies have not 
been affiliated with larger bodies nor have their officers been 
selected from schools given to social welfare work. They have 
not been technically conducted nor publicly advertised. They have 
been modest but at the same time earnest in their desire to aid 
the sorrowing and succor the needy, particularly in those days 
when persecution and blood-lust in Europe sent swarms of 
impoverished, terrorized Israelites here. The social organization 
that took charge of these refugees, as well as the local poor 
whom the children of Israel ever has among them, were the 
Jewish women who had displaced their husbands in congrega- 
tional benevolence. Industry, it was explained, curtailed the 
leisure men had to devote to this needful and essential philan- 
thropy. All Jews delight to do charity. Men, denied the 
privilege, delegated that labor to women. The women carried 
on this task in an unsystematic, unscientific manner perhaps, 
but with the intent to do what Jewish charity ever aimed to 
do, keep one from losing one’s self-respect and becoming a help- 
less dependent. 

As these ladies’ aid societies increased—practically all reform 
congregations housed an organization to discharge charitable 
duties and a few among the “modern” orthodox—the similarity 
of their aims and purposes were so generally known and accepted 
that it was suggested to federate them. This affiliation took 
place in the city of Cincinnati, 1913, under the auspices of the 
Union of American Hebrew Congregations, the foster parent of 
many measures and movements for the welfare of Israel, as 
described in a previous chapter. 


* As in Russia where student husbands “study” while their wives attend 
the markets and conduct business. See Dubnow, Vol. 3. 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 191 


There were fifty-six societies composed exclusively of Jewish 
women federated that year. In deference to their affiliation 
with the synagog, whose practical work it was their business 
to perform, these aid societies called themselves the National 
Federation of Temple Sisterhoods. The aid society became a 
“sisterhood” as a companion to the brotherhoods formed without 
the synagog but functioning in a similar channel, organized 
in 1922, 

The federation had its work marked out. As a sisterhood 
more pertinently affiliated with the congregation, whose com- 
plement it aimed to be, attention could be concentrated on the 
synagog, in contrast to the Council whose range of Jewish con- 
cern is larger. These concerns and interests extended from 
teaching and conducting the religious school to the practical 
details of finance (and even repairs) in the maintenance of the 
organization. The sisterhood marks the departure of the modern 
from ancient synagogs in the fact that women have absorbed 
wholly the privileges of men and clothe American Judaism with 
a garment essentially indigenous. No other phase of Judaism 
in any country of the world has accorded Jewish women the 
position held in the United States. There have been learned 
Jewesses in the mediaeval ages. The Biblical heroines, Miriam, 
Hulda, Deborah are products of primitive culture, and some say 
survivals of a matriarchal order. The Talmudic period figures 
a Beruria, the wife of Rabbi Meir. But everywhere the Jewess 
was the subject and inferior of the male, save in this country 
under the influence of American Judaism. 


The ascendency of women in the synagog is merely a registry 
of her emancipation of the world in general and her political 
enfranchisement in the United States. In every field of human 
endeavor, woman is being released from trammels that here- 
tofore curbed her talents. She is being freed from the tyranny 
of domesticity, from parental and marital domination, Her 
capacity to learn and adapt herself to the academic mannerism 
of the male, as well as to indulge in his intellectualism is no 
longer questioned seriously despite reaction.2° While there is 
less emphasis today on the similarity of the curriculum for 
men and women, college education is not regarded wasted for 
women, providing it is adjusted to her distinctly feminine needs. 


“This Freedom” by Hutchinson is the epistle of the skeptics who 
doubt the advantages accruing to modern women. 


192 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


The work of the world for men and women is not identical, and 
therefore the preparing for that work and that world should not 
be similar. Women, as a rule, are not given to abstract reason- 
ing which men appropriate as their genius, and men, on the 
other hand, are not so responsive to appeals of art. These 
differentiations are now being recognized and college courses 
are hedged to conform to them. With schools and colleges 
admitting women, are Jewish girls content to shrink into that 
obscurity to which their mothers humbly submitted? 


The American born Jewish girl will not accept the Oriental 
fatalism that edges through the fabric of rabbinism. Whether 
Judaism be the revelation of laws divinely given, or a continuous 
unfolding of the soul, touched by a belief in God, all-merciful 
and just, is of secondary importance to the Jewish woman who 
casts her vote in America. The political enfranchisement of 
women in America compels Judaism to be American if a Jewish 
woman is to perform her political duties. An orthodox Jew 
is not disturbed in the reciting of benedictions and in the dis- 
charge of his duties by the fact that he votes, but orthodox 
Jewess, if she insists on remaining orthodox, denies her citizen- 
ship. She is not an individual. She is created by the “Will of 
God” to be the underling of her husband, whom she must serve 
alone in fealty without an expression of opinion on the funda- 
mental, social, political or economic questions of her city, state 
or nation. 


Reform Judaism may justly be proud of the opportunities that 
released Jewish women in this country. But as anthropologists 
proved, man civilizes himself by domesticating wild animals. 
By this same token, in freeing Jewish women from the authority 
of rabbinical Judaism with its survivals of sex-taboos, the 
Reform Movement also freed the Jewish man. It enabled him 
to lift the ban of isolation that dyked the synagog against the 
inrush of waves of enlightenment and emancipation. It removed 
the shackles of authority superimposed on him and in its place 
located the scepter of moral sanction in his soul and conscience. 
His will was free to ally himself with a blessing and not a curse. 
and, free as he was, he did not cease fostering a love for his 
brethren of tradition and the covenant. Thus attuned, the 
Jew hails America and at his side, as partner in duty and service, 
stands the Jewess. 


The feministic movement then in the synagog is revealed in 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 193 


the gradual expansion of activities and assignment of duties. 
It is not singular nor unique. It is a transcript of the zeitgeist 
which distributes the right of individual self-realization equally 
among the sexes. Our Jewish women are not catering to a fad 
in assuming the burdens of congregational activity no more 
than Vassar, Smith, Barnard, Radcliff, coddles a whimsicality in 
granting women academic degrees. Jewish women are sharing 
this liberalization and kindling the “Ner Tomid” of inspiration 
in the synagog. Thus affiliated, societies of the National Fed- 
eration are sustaining the religious spirit in the congregations 
and extending the tether of tradition by enlarging the areas of 
congregational activities. By their accession to equality of 
service and all that this admission implies, a larger number 
of people are enabled to participate in the ceremonials of the 
congregation and in the application of Jewish beliefs and doc- 
trines to modern urban life. 

The National Federation of Temple Sisterhoods enjoins on 
its affliated members the primary aim of stressing their religious 
obligations. This mark of distinction is drawn to distinguish 
the realm of this federation from the Council of Jewish Women, 
whose field is wider as it has been explained. The limits of the 
respective fields were defined in order to avoid overlapping. 
Both societies are composed, in most instances, of identical 
persons, hence there is little antagonism, albeit party pride is 
often evident. 

The Sisterhood has, however, crystallized the objectives 
sought. They aim to increase attendance at religious services ; 
to assist the various enterprises of the synagog; to continue the 
traditional Jewish practice of associating study with the synagog 
by organizing study classes and lecture courses; to counteract 
the vicious pagan tendency of concentrating religious services 
exclusively in the temple and neglecting the sanctity of the 
home; to encourage home observances of religious ceremonials 
on festive occasions and holidays; to stimulate participation in 
the ritual at services by joining in singing and responses. 

Through the united effort of the National Federation, many 
welfare movements within Judaism have been inaugurated that 
would never have been established had it not been advanced 
and financed by the Sisterhoods. The National Federation 
counts 266 societies in its roster (1921).*1. A certain prestige 


“= 300 Societies, 1923. 


194 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


is attached to a society that counts a national membership of 
50,000 women, speaking in general terms, since there is no 
census. The national federation can undertake to open religious 
schools in smaller cities and rural communities. There are 
several isolated towns of few Jewish families whose children 
are detached from infancy from their religious group and yet 
who are in a measure responsible to that group and held account- 
able by the world for upholding Jewish standards of conduct 
and character. Gradually the sisterhoods are searching out these 
communities and, in conjunction with the Department of Syna- 
gog and School Extension,” establishing religious schools, often 
teaching the classes, and thus linking up Jewish families with 
a larger congregational group. 

No undertaking sponsored by the Sisterhood matches the 
importance and significance of the dormitory for the students 
of the Hebrew Union College which they financed. At the twen- 
ty-seventh biennial council held May 23, 1921, at Buffalo, N. Y. 
the Federation assumed the obligation of raising the funds for 
this laudable and equally imperative adjunct of this college at 
a cost approximating $250,000. The building is now erected on 
the campus and will house the students who were forced to shift 
for themselves in search of suitable quarters. The problems 
entailed in the housing shortage and other domestic exigencies 
had created a situation without an alternate solution. A dormi- 
tory had to be built. It is within the province of the Sisterhood 
to parallel collectively on a large scale what the men of the 
congregations did in forming the Union in 1873. The capacity 
of the Jew for group action is revealed among both sexes. In 
the distribution of activities connected with congregational 
administration, men and women now share alike in the United 
States. 

The Sisterhoods confined their endeavors within the range 
of the tabernacle of religions, finding in this area sufficient 
labors to engage them. Thus it comes to pass that the Sister- 
hood founded the museum of Jewish religious and ceremonial 
art, which is located in the Hebrew Union College. Stimulated 
by the desire to preserve a few of the ceremonial utensils of 
home and synagog for a generation unused to them, individual 
sisterhoods are collecting these ceremonial objects in their local 


* Activities explained in previous chapter, 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 195 


communities and creating a museum for the religious school of 
the reform temple. 

Assisting in religious education is one of the factors of sister- 
hood work, that is proving the work and worthiness of the 
organization. Every sisterhood assists the religious school of 
the congregation in whatsoever manner most needful. This may 
be by providing teachers, supplying school equipment, tracing 
absentees and even maintaining supplementary schools from its 
own income in localities where they are needed. 

Beyond the temple precincts the Sisterhood undertakes wel- 
fare work for delinquents and defectives. These are visited 
and whenever possible delicacies are supplied. In college towns, 
the Sisterhood endeavors to arrange receptions for Jewish stu- 
dents, to enable the children of the covenant to come together 
socially, Serving as patronesses or chaperons the Sisterhoods 
meet an urgent and a distinctly American situation by according 
the young men and women attending a university the occasion 
to meet in a wholesome Jewish homelike atmosphere. What 
a boon it would be to the Jewish students in the universities 
of Switzerland, for instance, were it possible for them to dwell 
together and merge the unity of their religious group under the 
kindly supervision of devoted Jewish women! There is vastly 
more co-education in America than in Europe and certainly 
many more Jewish girls at college here than abroad. No con- 
trast affords a more vivid picture of Judaism in America and 
that of Europe than the attitude of Europe and American Jew- 
ish students on the question of religion. Abroad Judaism is 
denied in favor of atheistic materialism or worse, among men 
as well as women.”* In America, Judaism is, with rare excep- 
tion, studied and practiced in order to inspire those who inherit 
it with a high desire of service and devotion of humanity. 

The Sisterhoods are guarding the young of Israel. Even in 
the little things, such as providing pews in the synagog for 
those students who chance to be away from home during the 
holidays. Still there is no individual nor any organization able 
to do so many eminently useful deeds in the synagogs of the 
community as the Sisterhoods. If America enjoys distinction 
in the reach and range of activities, within Jewry, a large mea- 


“In later years the reactionary governments, exclusion, boycott and the 
oppressions of antisemitism has drawn Jewish students the world over 
together. America’s Menorah succors European Jewish students whose 
heroism in their thirst for knowledge is miraculous. 


196 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


sure of praise belongs to the Jewish woman who obtains free- 
dom to realize her talents and to project her soul under the 
liberalizing influences of Reform Judaism. 

Vital as the activities of the Sisterhoods prove to be, the pro- 
gram of service rendered by Jewish women in America is not 
wholly confined to them. Liberated by the acceptance of Reform 
Judaism, the Jewish women of America, as soon as they were 
conscious of the possibilities of development, afforded them 
here, began to share the advantages of the Woman’s Movement 
in general. The synagog can not isolate itself, nor can the Jew. 
He is drawn into the tidewaves of thought that flood and ebb 
in the realm of the spirit. The Jew was the registrar of the thought 
movements that prevailed among the Arabs, the Saracens of 
Spain, and even the humanists and schoolmen of the Middle 
Age. The leading cultural motifs of the various civilization in 
whose midst the Jew has dwelt are deposited in the remains of 
Jewish literary achievements.”*. 

Limited as their contact in those benighted periods, they were 
able to absorb some of the atmosphere or incorporate a portion 
of the methodology and technique of current thought into their 
philosophies or exegesis. Thus it happens that influences, 
conscious or unconscious, were mutually exerted in bigoted 
eras. Naturally in more liberal periods the intimacies and 
friendly contacts of mind with mind resulted in stimulating 
Christian Hebraists, popularizing of Jewish philosophic books 
and lifting the veil of obscurity from Jewish mysticism and the 
Kabbalah. 

American Judaism is not a sole product of Jewish men. A 
few may remain rigorously orthodox in this country and still 
thrive in the exercise of their political franchise. But not so a 
Jewess. The vitality of Judaism in this country and the radia- 
tion of its influence is due to the mating of the American Jew 
and the Jewess in religious functions. No daughter accepts the 
Judaism of her immigrant mother because in this country women 
have abandoned the notions of sex-inferiority.22 A learned 
European Jew, it was recently reported in the newspapers, 1921, 
regarded himself so much the superior of his wife, that in im- 
migrating to this country, he sailed first class while his wife, a 
model of virtue and fidelity, was booked steerage. This good 


* Permanent Values in Judaism, by I. Abraham, Lecture I. 


* This is the recurring thesis of American Jewish fiction, “Salome of 
the Tenements,” for example. 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 197 


wife accepted her lot without protest and was utterly bewildered 
to learn that any objection should be raised against her accep- 
tance of the law of the Lord who had created her according to 
His will, the inferior of her scholarly husband whose learning 
made him the more to be revered. This case is very exceptional. 
Although the political franchise is no longer rated so highly, 
women vote. Previous to the passing of this constitutional 
amendment, women were entered into colleges, professions, busi- 
ness and in every way and walk heretofore monopolized by men. 
Political recognition lent them a dubious value. 

Given more leisure, women were quick to seize the oppor- 
tunity for self-culture which has now become one of their grati- 
fying achievements. No matter how superficial these exercises, 
our American women are still groping for better things. From 
the tiniest hamlet in the country to our metropolitan centers, 
there have been formed cultural organizations, or clubs, socie- 
ties, or sororities banded together for educational endeavors 
distinctly cultural in art, literature, music, science, and social, 
political and economic studies. The woman’s club is an endeavor 
on the part of the American woman—also in Europe a similar 
movement characteristic of this era prevails—to prepare herself 
for the new responsibilities she has now attained and for which 
she had to equip herself. 

Imitation has been called the sincerest form of flattery. Both 
the Council of Jewish Women and the Sisterhoods have bred 
imitators among those who reject American Judaism. Obsessed 
with the notion of nationalistic restoration, there is an element 
among the youth of orthodox Jewry who denounced the pro- 
gram of Reform Judaism in America. There are even Rabbis 
of Reform temples known to side with that faction in Jewry, 
whose intent it is to rebuild the ancient city of David in Asia 
Minor. The obsession of nationalism, like all mental aberra- 
tions, dies hard. But those adherents of this construction of 
Jewish destiny are not averse to imitation. They accept the 
methods of their American Jewish sisters, and have formed 
societies exclusively for women. The Hadassah is Zionistic in 
intent. Its members fancy themselves in exile while they obtain 
their education and sustenance from the United States. That 
American Judaism paved the way for the exercise of their desires 
is to them a matter of derision rather than praise. They e1.joy 
the freedom American Judaism has provided them and then 
forget those who loosened their bonds. 


198 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


The American Jewess is a new type, the creation of American 
Judaism which emancipated her from oriental inhibitions and 
the sex-taboos of tradition. There are emancipated Jewesses in 
England and on the continent of Europe. There are a few 
Jewish women in England who are intimately concerned in the 
welfare of congregations and synagog.”° 

The liberal synagog of London, however, is the only institu- 
tion across the waters among whose governing body are women 
corresponding in position and responsibility to our American 
Jewish women. The women’s movement in the synagog of 
Europe is not as far advanced as it is in America, consequently 
the Jewish women of the United States are concerned in large 
and liberal ways with their religion. Theirs not merely the 
duty to preserve it, but to practice it and illustrate by their lives 
that they, too, have been called of old to be.a blessing in this 
new world, as well as their fathers, brothers, husbands, sons. 


If there is any criticism one might proffer the Jewish woman 
(unsolicited naturally), but none the less sincerely tendered 
it is the caution that they leave to the scholars and teachers of 
Israel the prerogative which belongs to them. Theirs should 
be the ability to decide what is Jewish or not, and the right to 
announce it publicly. There is an imminent peril ever impend- 
ing that Jewish people accept the standard and attitude of their 
neighbors who outnumber them in overwhelming majority as 
right and proper, since theirs are the values of the majority, and 
hence right, because it is the conviction of the masses. It has 
been shown that the Jewish women fill a vital definite function 
in the social economy of the community and the congregation 
of Israel. But this function does not include the privilege of 
deciding or establishing what is or is not Jewish. Without the 
credentials of scientific authority of history or literature, no 
one should decide a Jewish precedent or practice. There is the 
ever present danger that the Jewish women will usurp the right 
of the teacher and scholar and outline what is Jewish or not 
Jewish, without qualifications to do so. Action of this sort is 
unJewish. No decision of rabbinical law?’ could be made by 
one disqualified to render a decision, and the Jewish women, 
without adequate training in the theology and literature of Juda- 


* The Liberal Synagog of London is conscious of adaptations from the 
Reform Synagogs of the United States. 


* Mishna Sanhedrin, 6a, sqq. 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 199 


ism, are in no position to pass judgment on what is a Jewish 
practice or doctrine. 

There is an inclination on their part to regard religion as an 
extraneous substance, a sort of garment to be put on and taken 
off. Whereas, according to Jewish tradition and revelation, 
religion motivates all our affairs and conduct. Yet the Jewish 
women as some of their circulars attest, would have religion be 
a special emotional urge, overtaking one on stated occasions, 
furnished, for the event like a society woman apparelled for a 
reception. Hence their petition “to introduce religion into the 
home,” or their latest contrivance, “to institute a week of relig- 
ious revivals among Jews.” Both are so contrary to instinct 
and temperament of the Jews as to warrant one in suspecting 
Christian authorship of this petition. It does provoke a word 
of caution. Rabbinical Judaism established conventions and 
practices: those rules of action in the doing of which one became 
pious, that is, in the nomenclature of our era, religious. To 
transgress the law was a violation of the established rules of 
action and the requital due such unfulfillment of the “minhag,” 
or the “mores,” in its detailed elaboration was excommunica- 
tion. Religion was not excluded from life, but ever in the actions 
involved in living. As one conformed one was religious. The 
advance over this position manifest and expressed in American 
Judaism is the extension of the ethical motive and consciousness 
to embrace the totality of life. Religion embraces every act of 
life. A mother who rears her children intelligently, who accepts 
some of the suggestions announced by hygienists, dieticians, 
pedagogues, social welfare workers, and applies them in the 
rearing of her children is as religious as she who pronounces a 
blessing over the paraffin candles lighted after six o’clock on a 
Friday evening. 

The tendrils of tradition penetrate the consciousness of every 
Jew. A people seeped in ceremonials for centuries can not rid 
themselves of the habit of confounding ceremony with religion 
against which prophetic Judaism rebelled in the days of the 
ancient prophets of Israel and continue so to this day. The 
sentimental appeal to introduce religion in the home means the 
revival of ceremonials in the home—against which there is no 
objection. On the contrary, there is an urgent demand for them 
there—but the ceremonial must contain content. If it instills 
no message, inspires no action towards humanizing mankind. 


200 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


then it is useless, an abomination which no Jewish woman 
should be guilty of sponsoring. 

A like stricture may be laid on the women who insist on a “re- 
vival” after the fashion of their neighbors whose religious inter- 
pretation is in a vernacular often heard but slightly understood 
by them. One is born into Judaism. For the Jews are a people 
and the Jewish religion is an expression of that relationship 
set up in the vision of this people between the mass apperception 
of their ideals (which is God) and themselves. 

Among the Jewish people God is not verified by speculation 
nor is He rationally discovered in nature. God is the lofty 
vision of our ideals, the symbolization of our aspirations, “the 
light whereby we see light.” Pursuant to this conception, and 
in consequence of that mode of life reflected and reacting there- 
from, the Jewish people are banded together to so live that all 
mankind may learn from them the way of life which is the 
humanizing of humanity or the fostering of civilization. The 
Jewish people are historically upheld to inspire the multi- 
tudinous hosts of humanity with the zeal of love for their fellow 
men and to lend themselves for this common task, their collective 
ends and social welfare as a community, not as individuals. 


Judaism is incapable of being “revived” in the ordinary sense 
this word is used in Protestant Evangelical circles. Juda- 
ism is continuous as life is endless, wherein God daily renews 
the marvels of His creation. Again the prompting for a revival 
is a resurgence of the ceremonial complex, the tingling remorse 
surviving in the consciousness of the Jewish people that having 
no rite or ceremony to fulfill or discharge a sin is being com- 
mitted whose punishment may be decreed in some disaster sure 
to overtake the superstitious. For it never fails that those who 
suspect things to happen invariably obtain the happening they 
suspect. 

There is implied in this overture for a revival an appeal for 
long neglected ceremonials of trivial import and silly. Perhaps 
the women who buy their bread of the corner delicatessen store 
will begin baking and set aside a “challah’’?*® to welcome Sab- 
bath. Perhaps the women mean to restore the “Habdalah;’”® 
both ceremonials are poetic and enhance the beauty that lurks 


* A portion of the loaf broken off used in blessing the Sabbath, a sur- 
vival of a primitive sacrifice. 


*® Ceremony of dismissing the Sabbath. 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 201 


in our ceremonials were we minded to view them with com- 
posure and joy. 

It is not likely that this is the end sought. The “revival” 
means perhaps religious services, faithful attendance thereoi, 
and patient hearkening to the discourse and pious devotion in 
reading the prayerbook while in the synagog. Yet even so, 
this is not what the Lord desires. He hath told thee, O man, 
what he desires: To love mercy, to do justly and walk the earth 
reverently. And herein is the answer to this scheme of a relig- 
ious revival! 

The Jewish women of America have a supreme opportunity 
and a superior task. They may well dedicate themselves to the 
program set forth by the Sisterhood and Council of Jewish 
Women, the humanizing of their humanity in civic health and 
social well being. Vastly religious is that woman who upliits 
the fallen, teaches the ignorant. Indeed they behold God’s 
presence and hearken to the Master of the World, as does she 
who now plans and agitates for a Child Labor Law, declared 
unconstitutional along with the Minimum Wage law, which 
practically tells the woman wage earner that the city streets 
are made wide enough in case she can not earn sufficient wages 
to maintain herself in decency and prosperity. The women 
who are financially so circumstanced as to be exempt from the 
necessity of wage earning might lend their tenderness and 
mothering instincts to protect their less wealthy sisters. Insofar 
as they do this they are religious, or religion is a childish 
geegaw! 

Again women are not naturally instinctively more religious 
than men. Strictly speaking there is no religious instinct no 
more than there is an instinct for acquiring wealth. Men may 
seek approbation and hence give themselves to the pursuit of 
wealth for that end. Women may by like motive seek approba- 
tion of their sisters by lending their assistance to support the 
synagog. This is not a “religious instinct.” The synagog is 
the spiritual center of the Jewish people wherein radiate these 
ethical influences accumulated during centuries. It is the 
depository of the aspirations, as it is the treasure-house of the 
ambitions, hopes, the passion and the poetry of the Jewish 
people who have overarched the world with their enthusiasm 
for God and their elation over humanity. The influence of the 
synagog is the influence of art and all implication interwoven 
with the conception of life given in freedom by a God who is 


202 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


Himself free, the master of nature and not the abject servant 
of the wind or thunder or the piercing sharpness of lightning. 

The women of America, among their Jewish sisters, heirs of 
a tragic past, kin to the mothers of poet and prophet, bred of the 
stock of Mary and Martha, and a sainted host of martyred 
mothers, are now elevated to a high station. They have become 
in the unfolding of the curtain the saviors of the race. Human- 
ity looks to them for salvation. From them must issue the 
impulses to conserve the hard-wrought structures of humanity. 
They must preserve the cultures and arts. They must stand 
between greed and grasping selfishness. To them humanity 
looks for intercession against the dead hand of law, shackling 
progress by intolerable precedents of legal fictions. Now that 
they are free as individuals, as free women not bondwomen, 
let them lighten the burden of their impoverished wage earning 
sisters in stores, shop, mill, factory—not that labor is not divine, 
but that labor unredeemed is slavery. The women of these 
United States can join hands with their Jewish comrades whose 
hearts have throbbed in that love which suffered its own hurt 
and changed not. 

This is not the place to catalog the achievements of certain 
gifted Jewish women of this country in literature, science, art. 
There are Jewish novelists, actresses, lawyers, physicians, social 
workers, newspaper women, politicians, professors and scores 
of successful business women. There are many Jewish women 
who are no longer averse to farming and dare live in that 
hitherto most dreaded resort—the country. There are a number 
of splendid Jewish women sufficiently independent and self- 
centered to do without a delicatessen, a bakery-shop and the 
corner grocery, who can milk cows, care for poultry, supervise 
the domestic duties of a farm house, where no one lives from 
hand to mouth, as flat and tenement habitues. 

These pages are not designed to enumerate the names of 
eminently successful Jewish writers or theatrically famous Jew- 
ish women. An effort has been made to outline the policy of 
liberation that resulted in creating such opportunities for Jewish 
women that those qualified could ultilize them for greater seld- 
realization. These new situations hinged on the widening 
recognition of American Judaism, which permitted in larger 
areas a larger range of action, and action makes destiny. To 
all those women of Israel who have attended the sunlit heights 
of glory in art, science, the professions and commerce, the con- 


THE AMERICAN JEWESS 203 


gregation of Israel brings praise for the blessing and boon they 
are able to bestow on all humanity. They, in the scriptural 
sentence assigned her of old, 


“Give her of the fruit of her hands; 
And let her works praise her in the gates.” 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS 
ENTERPRISES 


Reform Judaism in the United States can no longer plea 
exemption from responsibility on the score of youthfulness, nor 
shield itself behind the barricade of immaturity. It has attained 
its coming of age and is now full grown. Throughout the 
country reform congregations are now celebrating their Golden 
Jubilee, and Diamond Anniversaries. Bene Jeshurun of Cincin- 
nati commemorated (in January, 1924) the centennial of 
its founding. These few English Jewish settlers of that 
Queen City on the Ohio who, a hundred years ago, follow- 
ing the trend of their tradition and hearkening to that mystic 
whisper of the soul which speaks to Israel through the trumpet 
of centuries, has become legion. The tabernacle they established 
has been transmuted into a hallowed shrine. A like attribute 
may be assigned many other cities. The few and feeble have 
become a mighty host. Several congregations are at present 
signalizing the continuity of their organization as that of Bene 
Jeshurun, having maintained their organic existence fully as 
long if not longer. B'rith Kodesh, Rochester, N. Y., B’nai 
Jeshurun, Newark, N. J., made a public event of their seventy- 
fifth anniversary. Throughout the south and southwest, in 
sections associated in the average mind with prairies and cattle 
ranges, the least settled portion of the country, there are con- 
gregations observing their fiftieth anniversary. In cities like 
Memphis, Dallas, El Paso the reform congregations have been 
established over fifty years, and the event marked during the 
year 1923 at a public function in which the citizens of Jewish 
faith were honored by their fellow-townsmen for their contri- 
butions of culture, moral enthusiasm and art as well as their 
enrichment of multifarious industries and commerce. Tested 
by this standard, Reform Judaism has certainly been refined in 
the crucible of time. No Jewish congregation of orthodox lean- 
ings—and there were a few dissenters from reform—has held 
together as many years as reform congregations, with the noted 
exception of the Hungarian congregation, Obed Zadek, New 
York City. If Judaism, as manifested and expressed in the 
United States during the Nineteenth and Twentieth centuries, 


204 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 205 


contains the vitality to renew or propagate its kind, that is to 
say, Judaism, in order to endure must project programs and 
forecast its future trend. It must leave unfinished tasks for 
future generations. Standing on the Pisgah heights of the 
present, it must overlook the promised land of achievement each 
century discloses. This is what has been the role of the Jew 
in ages past, and it is likely to be his portion here. There are 
misgivings to counteract roseate promises and prospects to test. 
The purpose of this chapter is to survey the field as it has been 
sown and to weigh the grains garnered in that harvest. 

Come, let us reason together, as Isaiah said to his recalcitrant 
country-men. Let us objectify the activities of our congrega- 
tions and from this inspection obtain values of appreciation. 
Admitting that merely the fewest are concerned in this tour, 
for only the fewest are in any wise concerned with Judaism or 
religion, its problems and destiny. Sordid materialism has 
clutched the myriads of Jews in an embrace of rigor mortis.* 
Yet these few, it is interesting for them to know that in their 
beginnings those reform congregations now marking anniver- 
saries were orthodox in the sense that word is used today. Their 
Judaism was realistic, ceremonial, legal and practiced for its 
own sake. It was an end in itself, a product of life and not a 
process of living. 

It could not be otherwise since there was no other Jewish 
sect migrating here except those who lived under the control 
of rabbinic Judaism which was beginning to be questioned and 
later modified, as explained in a previous chapter. The change 
in ritual and interpretation characteristic of the modern synagog 
was the labor of the past decades. The contentions of Reform 
Rabbis such as I. M. Wise, Samuel Hirsch, David Einhorn, 
Max Landsberg, K. Kohler, E. G. Hirsch, Bernard Felsenthal 
and others, made possible the wider acceptance of Reform Juda- 
ism throughout the country, enlarging on their German inheri- 
tances and thus paving the way for our present phase which is 
designated as “American” since it is more in accord with our 
national spirit.? 

1“The New York Ghetto,” by Joseph Opatoshu. 

2 There were other rabbis in this country save these leaders who were 
indubitably reform and active in adjusting their brethren of the covenant 
to their new environment. Some were not so outspoken. There were 
shades and variations of reformers. The majority of rabbis migrating 


from Germany were touched by the spirit of reform. A large number 
graduated from the Seminary at Breslau, some from the Jewish High 


206 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


During the past century of settlement, the task on the plane 
of the spirit, granted one may so describe it, was that of adjust- 
ment: a Judaism had to be evolved in conformity to the modes 
and mores of the United States, a democracy, and by the way 
the first democracy in which Jewish people had ever domiciled. 
The congregations as these existed at present are the crystalliza- 
tion of those forces that moved the founders to dwell together, 
if not always in unity none the less in the name of Israel whose 
memory brought them together for worship. 

Congregations were usually compounded of Jews hailing from 
many lands, albeit the majority were from Germany. That 
balance, however, was upset many years ago. Congregations 
are often conglomerates, that is composed of groups from all 
quarters of European Jewry: England, Austro-Hungary, Galicia, 
Russia, with a lessening admixture of American or the descend- 
ants of German Jews.?® 

The large influx of immigrants from East European countries 
wherein orthodox or rabbinic Judaism has held undisputed sway 
for a millenium now outnumbers the reform Jews and despoils 
them of their prerogative attached formerly to a majority party. 
They are now in the minority, conscious of their dwindling 
number. Reform congregations that formerly towered above 
all other synagogs are now overshadowed, often side-tracked 
and infrequently of such insignificance as to exercise no com- 
pelling attention whatsoever in the community whose Jewish 
spokesman in matters appertaining to Jews and Jewish affairs, 
is the orthodox rabbi (frequently a nationalistic Zionist) instead 
of the American Jewish minister. No phase of Judaism can 
remain static or immobile; hence there are those among the 
orthodox who predict the demise of Reform Judaism. These 
claim that it is now “anaemic” and doomed, a victim of spiritual 
phthisis. 

American Jewish rabbis are conscious of the lessening impor- 
tance of their message, since they are spokesmen of a minority. 
Many are perturbed by the inadequacy of their message and 
mission. Some are bold to confess that reform was a mistake.* 
And as the burdens of the new era are being assumed by younger 


School at Berlin and others from academies in Austro-Hungary. German 
trained rabbis brought reformed tendencies with them. Their opponents 
here usually came from more conservative centers of Europe. 

* Reform Movement in Judaism, by Philipson, p. 461, sqq. 

“Conference Sermon, Yr. Bk. C.C.A.R., Vol. 33. 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 207 


men and women, Reform Judaism fails to lend them, they say, 
neither inspiration nor heroism, courage and devotion that forti- 
fied their parents in their day and generation. A searching of 
hearts accompanied by as eager an examination of methods is 
now being invoked among American Jews to diagnose these 
symptoms. For there is a waning of the zeal characteristic of 
the fathers. The flames of enthusiasm that illumined their 
pathway are dim, and in many cases extinct. Congregations as 
important as Chicago Sinai® confess that the sons of the found- 
ing fathers fail to assume the burden of their sires. Only a 
dwindling company perpetuate the announcement of those truths 
of Reform Judaism whereby men live in that great adventure 
which is life. Few of the young, it is alleged, are quickened by 
the poetic fervor of the message Israel proclaimed. The few 
who have declared any interest manifest it in behalf of national- 
istic Judaism. What is true of this group, viz: Sinai Congre- 
gation, applies equally to other congregations in varying degree. 

Is American Judaism likely to continue? Will it be the 
expression of conviction and purpose among the generation 
coming to consciousness today? It is from this angle of obser- 
vation that American Judaism now engages us. For it is from 
the basis of those events happening in this era that the Judaism 
of the future—presumably American—will arise. Out of our 
present policy and enterprises will the youth of today be pre- 
pared for their portion of labor in this vineyard of the Lord. 

The preachment of Reform Judaism announced the univer- 
sality of religion among mankind, and insisted that all of life 
is under the sway of religion—not merely that range of life 
comprehended by rabbinical codes. Hence the synagog is not 
the mere guardian of a ritual or a set of ceremonials, unique 
among men, which in various forms prevail among all peoples, 
but a medium of stimulation. In doctrine it is the source of 
influence directing all the acts of its group. In this manifesta- 
tion it is following tradition faithfully and in the pioneer years 
Reform Jews built synagogs to foster these views and con- 
struction. They used their opportunity to establish this con- 
ception of Jewish destiny in the United States. Their rabbis 
resorted to rationality and academic procedure to elucidate them 
and being in touch with the spirit of the age which was ration- 
alistic, their preachment of Reform Judaism became tinged with 


° 41st Anniversary Sermon of E. G. Hirsch, 


208 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


intellectualism. Reason was petted and coddled as the safest 
virtue to companion, and so long as the mind was stimulated 
and reason given undisputed control there was no other regard 
entertained for other cravings and promptings of man. His 
mind was catered to more than his heart. 

And this is precisely the shortcoming the teachers of Israel 
suspect: man is emotional as well as intellectual. Judaism 
could not be contained in the staid vestment of mentality alone. 
It had to recognize the emotional promptings of the heart, stir- 
rings of the spirit whispering to man of the mysterious back- 
ground of his ancestry. Then again there were other functions 
and aspects of life comprehended by the edict of religion than 
solemn worship, and these being sanctioned by tradition were 
also valid. To these stimuli originated in emotion the Jew 
responded subconsciously because he is linked to tradition, and 
likewise is he an outcome of heredity. Through the long suc- 
cession of Jewish souls who somehow still call each unto his 
humanity this day, the Jew feels he is more than a devotee of 
a religion, or an adherent to a religious sect, with whose creed 
he is in intellectual accord. The Jew realizes the mystic element 
in his covenantal relationship with God. And yet he posits the 
ethical laws which control his life and discipline him in modera- 
tion, chastity, considerateness, tenderness, charity, justice, as 
the highest manifestation of the spirit of God. Fulfilling these 
laws (that is practicing virtue and living uprightly) he furthers 
harmony in the world which he calls peace, and by spreading 
peace among men each one is the better able to realize his own 
creative energy whereby each one lends fulfillment and mater- 
iality to his inner visions and so enriches the world. Be that 
contribution a work of art or the ordinary labor entailed in 
daily living, both are valued, since that labor spent is added to 
the commonwealth. By giving himself he enriches humanity. 
Not for himself alone does he strive, but through himself as an 
instrumentality he contributes to the larger group which is the 
state or nation or society. 

The pulpits of reform congregations from which flowed 
inspiration for non-Jew as well as Jew were in the earlier 
decades of that movement in this country intensely intellectual 
in the presentation of the spoken work contrasted with the ritual. 
The themes of the pulpit discourses were as a rule philosophical 
and theological, as one might suspect in a rationalistic age from 
a group of propagandists. These sermons may have been chary 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 209 


of emotional appeals, yet the intent of the pulpit address was 
ethical inspiration or the imparting of historical information. 
It was the treatment that awearied not merely “tired business 
men” but the growing number of indifferent and disinterested 
who were gradually outgrowing the academic style and the tech- 
nique of the sermon which was patterned after German 
standards. 

There was reason for this method which replaced the former 
“haggadic”® style, which was an inheritance of ancient days. 
According to this antiquated technique, a biblical text, usually 
from the pentateuchal pericope, was elaborated inordinately with 
biblical and post-biblical, that is, rabbinical quotations, irrele- 
vant and immaterial often and utilized in the casuistry of the 
speaker for the sake of exhibiting familiarity with platitudes 
and maxims of homely wisdom, filtering through the prudence 
and experience of the Jewish people. This style of preaching 
is discarded alike by the younger rabbinical graduates of ortho- 
dox seminaries and reform. When the reform rabbis began 
their ministry in this country they were actuated by the desire 
to influence the lives of their congregation as Jews and Ameri- 
cans. They developed an intellectual method to embody these 
convictions, for in those days the ceremonial commemorated 
in the ritual of the synagog, entered into the life of the members 
through its accompanying celebration in the homes more inti- 
mately than at present. Hence service and sermon were items 
of importance, not incidents as these have become in the weekly 
program of a modern congregation where these exercises, for- 
merly the sole functions of the synagog, are now listed along 
with, or on undisputed footing of equality, with social events. 
literary and dramatic entertainments, gymnasium, domestic 
science classes, etc. 

This austere intellectual mien (it was at times pedantic) was 
essential in the propaganda of Reform Judaism. These rabbis 
who sponsored reform had to argue. They had to prove their 
thesis and justify their positions. It was no longer an occasion 
to amuse soporific congregations by verbal jugglery. American 
Jews were under the necessity of formulating anew their con- 
ception of Judaism since here they were ordering their lives in 
totally different channels than in Europe. It is, therefore, not 
strange that sermons by Samuel Hirsch or Einhorn or Kohler 


6 The Haggadah refers to that strata in rabbinical fiterature, which in 
contrast to the legal, Halakah, is homiletical, allegorical, poetic. 


210 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


or Landsberg and their opponents, Kohut, Jastrow, Huebsch, 
Morais, Lesser, et al., should have been the quintessence of 
scholarship. These rabbis aimed to prove the thesis of the 
gradual unfolding of Judaism in history and the religion had 
ceased to be an end in itself, but on the contrary the spirit of 
God motivating all Jewish lives. To these men and their 
immediate successors, the present generation of American Jews 
are debtor because these pioneer rabbis explored the sources 
and showed the process of historical growth as revealed in Jew- 
ish literature, from of old unto this hour. In their investigations 
of the ceremonials, their concepts and theological views con- 
tained in Jewish literature a scientific method was established 
and frequently reflected in their sermons.’ Their deductions 
were as important, as for example Hirsch’s “Die Humanitat als 
Religion Religion-sphilosophia der Juden,” for the Jew of today 
as Maimonides’ “Guide for the Perplexed” was in his or Saady’s 
“Faith and Reason” for the generation it illuminated. 

But this intellectuality of the reform pulpit engendered a 
reaction. The endeavor of this reaction is to counteract this 
very intellectual atmosphere and Jewish history affords a 
parallel in a degree to this course in the rise of mysticism that 
follows the publication of the “Guide for the Perplexed” by 
Maimonides. The rationalism of the great Aristotelean philoso- 
pher, physician and exegete brought forth, in course of time, 
as Abelson in his “Jewish Mysticism” points out,® a reaction 
which was expressed in a craving for greater emotional elation 
and expression—which is in a degree the equivalent to the pres- 
ent clamor for more “spiritually in the synagog,’ more solem- 
nity, more mysticism or whatever contour assumed by emotion- 
alism. Whatever wave or rupture surcharges the reverent 
worshippers—chiefly women—the aim is to avoid the academic 
or intellectual. These in the idiom of the hour, are styled “deep” 
sermons. No rabbi among the younger set dare be “deep” and 
expect to retain the aphrodasical adulation of his doting con- 
gregants. 

The means used to combat scholarship and academic metho- 
dology in the pulpits of reform congregations varies. When 
classified they are revealed as two mutually antagonistic mani- 
festations of the Jewish spirit. As in the post-Maimonidean 
~t Abraham Geiger’s Allgemeine Einleitung in die Wissenschaft des Ju- 


denthums, p. 63, sqq. 
® Jewish Mysticism, by J. Abelson, p. 13. 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 211 


period, a reaction set in, in which the dominant phase was mysti- 
cism and pietism, or to give it the technical term, chassidism, 
so there is in our day intimations of a like reaction, a sort of 
neo-chassidic revival which will be analyzed in the following 
chapter. The other drift characteristic of the present generation 
are activities in congregations. Reform Jews, conscious of the 
fulfillment of the preachment of Reform Judaism, packed the 
interim between the present and the forecasting of a future 
program with the organization of religious enterprises as a sub- 
stitute and supplement of their pulpits. As a rostrum advocating 
a new construction of Judaism, the reform temples of previous 
decades had a definite plan and answered a cogent need. That 
propaganda having been accepted, reform temples justify their 
existence by assuming activities of a cultural, educational, recre- 
ational character, all of which is in keeping with the Jewish 
tradition and is a fulfillment of Judaism’s intent to encompass 
the totality of human existence and make that tally with God. 

In the evident reaction from the former intense intellec- 
tualism of the synagog—characteristic also of modern philoso- 
phy, as is witnessed in the wide-spread acceptance of Bergson’s 
Intuitionalism—the function of the rabbi of reform temples is 
subject to several modifications. There is imminent danger 
that he may be coerced into subordinating his traditional role 
of teacher of religion into that of a Jewish sexton, who, in the 
parlance of the Jewish people, has become the butt of all jokes, 
as well as a jack of all trades, and dubbed the “schammus.” 
Reform rabbis have been jealous of their prerogative as teacher, 
and they contrast this function with that of the orthodox rabbi 
who is an ecclesiastical lawyer, deciding the law, that is the 
“Halakah” according to codes of various compilations. As an 
example of the method, consult the response to the question 
Whether Unfermented Wine May be Used in Jewish Cere- 
monies, By Prof. L. Ginsburg, in Vol. 25, J. P. S. of America 
Yr. Bk. This rabbinical question is decided according to the 
rules of the rabbis with subtlety, casuistry and subterfuge. It 
was the business of the orthodox rabbi to decide questions 
involving the legality and validity of practices and behavior 
according to precedent. The danger that now menaces the 
American rabbinate of reform proclivities lurks in just this ten- 
dency to convert the teacher into a social worker, an organizer 
of clubs, an enterpeneur of entertainments, a frock-coat impres- 
sario of chamber music and soloists, who is “the good-mixer” 


212 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


of common lingo, hail-fellow well met with every one, and 
engaged in his “business of selling religion.” There is no longer 
any concealment made of the transparent attempt to sublimate 
the apparatus of administration in the synagog to the policy of 
business efficiency. 

The technique of the reform rabbi has never solidified as it did 
among the orthodox rabbinate. In older Jewries the rabbi knew 
what was expected of him. The moderns do not. In his “Inti- 
mate Glimpses of a Rabbi’s Career,” Berkowitz analyzes a few of 
the problems besetting the young rabbi on the score of etiquette 
and mannerisms becoming the alleged “leader” of the Jewish 
community, but does not pry deeper, nor plumb the foundations 
of the new order in light of the attitude of this generation and 
the modifications entailed in the present social order whereby the 
rabbi’s career is mightily affected. Judging by this volume, the 
technique of the reform rabbi is a matter of etiquette, detailing 
the mannerisms befitting one who approaches people in the 
solemn moments of their existences: the crisis and tragedies of 
life, and as an authorized representative of a group delegated to 
express the sentiments of that group impersonally if not 
abstractly. 

That the rabbi is, for instance, delegated to conduct funerals 
and deliver eulogies whether the departed merits it or not is, 
in the light of Jewish tradition, a new role. In older groups, 
anyone might recite the simple dignified burial ritual and to do 
so was accorded a meritorious act. Marriage, being a contract, 
had to be legally transacted, and the rabbi was therefore quali- 
fied to prepare the marriage contract. Aside of this, and ren- 
dering decisions already mentioned, there was no function 
especially delegated the rabbi to the exclusion of any other 
member of his group. On the score of sanctity and sacerdotal 
exemptions, Jewry had no patience, much less respect. While 
Jewry has its liberal allotment of hokum, bunk and superstition, 
it never for any length of time in western civilizations, differ- 
entiated its rabbi from the group on the score of superior sanc- 
tity. Save from the standpoint of scholarship, the rabbi was in 
no wise different from his fellow members. To stress the dis- 
tinction as is being done by attributing to the laymen among 
American Jews qualities not inherent in rabbis, or assuming 
rabbis have attained qualities not possessed by their fellowmen, 
is an egregious and monstrous folly. Lest American Jews be 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 2138 


accused of foisting this transparent humbug on the nation, there 
had better be in Jewish circles an abatement of the phrase “lay- 
men,” which is at best unJewish. If countenanced by reform 
rabbis, it betokens their agreement and acceptance of the accusa- 
tion that their profession is merely a society function. There is 
a certain condescension in these later days, on the part of reform 
rabbis, toward their profession, from scholarly research to “prac- 
tical” social service. This is often in the nature of an usurpation 
of the traditional prerogatives of that famous factotum of the 
synagog, namely, the schammus or sexton,® as previously 
intimated. i at J 

Following the path of these tendencies leads to one end: the 
modern rabbi goaded on by the reactionary spirit of our decade 
is unwittingly transforming the technique of his profession into 
that of a “worker,” instead of a teacher or a student. He 
regards himself not one who leads his people to the rock that is 
higher than the low level of their aims, but as becomes a sub- 
limated schammus: “gives the people what they want,’ and 
the people, his congregation, want “pep” as a rule, the obvious 
self-evident truisms and commonplaces.’° 


The evidences of this drift in the congregational currents are 
registered in the year-books now published by our largest Jew- 


* Specialization invades the administration of religion as it possesses 
other fields of human endeavor. As life tends towards abstracting func- 
tions, impersonalizing them, objectifying and mechanicalizing, so the proc- 
ess is now passed over into the synagog. Formerly all humane acts, 
visiting the sick, burying the dead, clothing the naked, feeding the hun- 
gry, were undertaken by any member of a Jewish community, not as a 
burden but as a service, a mitzvah. To do any one act of kindness was 
esteemed a favor by him or her who did it. So thought he or she to 
whom a kindness was rendered, All benevolence has now been delegated 
to special agents, among them the rabbi, who vicariously serves the com- 
munity as the representative and symbol of the charity impulse of the 
group. 

*” That the rabbi should be qualified as a social worker is accepted with- 
out reservation by Dr. Berkowitz, who says that the rabbi will find himself 
coming in contact more and more with the concerns of everyday life, and 
under the necessity of expounding the moral issues that arise. The need 
for preparing the rabbi for intelligent participation in philanthropic and 
social movements is recognized and the field of social service is being cul- 
tivated as a profession so closely allied to the function of rabbi that many 
rabbis use their rabbinical training as a stepping stone into this new field 
of social endeavor. Op. Cit., p. 131. 


214 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


ish congregations and in the weekly bulletins issued by nearly 
all our reform synagogs.** 


These publications are replete with programs of congrega- 
tional activities and the tabulation of events in the sphere of 
religious enterprises. These present a variety of diversions 
within the precincts of the congregation or conducted under its 
auspices. In these publications are enumerated the date and 
meeting of classes in literature, history and art; club and fra- 
ternal meeting hours; congregational dinners; dances, entertain- 
ments; concerts; lectures; readings; debates; open forums; 
musicals; theatricals, even gymnastics and boy and girl scout 
exhibits, and multifarious items of a like sort. 


At first blush one might be tempted to make a sweeping gen- 
eralization and say that our modern Jewish pulpit has become 
so flat and unpalpable that something else had to be substituted 
to redeem it. Radicals like Scott Nearing claim that church and 
synagog are incapable of sympathy with the wage-earner. Some 
socialists, both Jewish and non-Jewish, deny the function of 
religion because they contend it is “a hireling ministry,” the 
bastard of capitalism.”** Yielding to the views of these extrem- 
ists one might join the chorus of condemners and say the mod- 


* Year Books are now issued by many congregations. These contain- 
ing the roster of membership, enrollment of children in school by classess, 
muster-roll of the dead and cradle-roll of births; outlines of events from 
calendar of synagog, school and other social quarters; sermon-topics; 
events in which the rabbi participated; addresses delivered by him before 
different bodies and organizations; financial statement; reports from rabbi, 
superintendent of school, president of congregation and various officers, 
Sisterhood, Brotherhood, boy and girl scouts, and often a brief history 
of the congregation with names and epitomized biographies of former 
rabbis and cantors. This is the content in the main of the Year Book 
issued by Keneseth Israel, Philadelphia. When this elaborate schedule is 
not followed, brief reports are circulated. A large number of congrega- 
tions issue weekly, bi-weekly or monthly bulletins. These are supple- 
mentary congregational announcements of interest to the members and 
inform them of events within the congregation or the community. 

12 Laboring people ignore the Church because the clergy are more re- 
tainers of the capitalists and trim their words accordingly, says Berkowitz. 
The hostile feeling between capital and labor, he says, can best be coun- 
teracted by the minister. They are allied with the workers as earners of 
salaries. They are allied with captains of industry as administrators of 
affairs. Therefore, in the great industrial warfare now being waged, a 
supreme opportunity is at hand, namely, to arbitrate these difficulties ac- 
cording to the arbitrament of that higher law of which the minister is the 
recognized champion and guardian. Op. Cit., p. 129. 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 215 


ern American rabbi, in order to save his face, is driven into 
extraneous field of a theatrical entrepeneur."® 

Judging from the content and general tone of the bulletins 
and year-books, the statistics of members and meetings, quan- 
titative data, far outreaches the message of the pulpit.* The 
slight reference paid the sermon leads one to infer that in the 
judgment of the editors of these aforementioned publications the 
pulpit is subordinated. Yet in the earlier stages of the reform 
movement, the pulpit was central, the sole agency for the trans- 
mission of that revelation of righteousness which is Judaism. 
One might conclude that either the rabbi’s wings of inspiration 
have been clipped or his occupation as a preacher is gone or he 
has been converted into a social worker, an executive of phi- 
lanthropy and amusement. Congregational year-books and bul- 
letins force home the conviction thaat the rabbi is chiefly a pur- 
veyor of entertainments instead of a teacher, an institutionalist 
not an inspirationalist, as his predecessors in office. And as for 
being the “spiritual leader of the community’”—one accepts the 
euphonism with a tolerant smile since the term is alien to Israel. 
The prestige of the pulpit has passed, never to return, some 
ministers claim.?® 


** Joseph Opatoshu’s “The New York Ghetto.” 

“Reform Judaism may be said to advance these dogmas, using that 
term however not in the Paulinian-evangelical sense: 

(a) “The world and humanity are under the guidance of God who re- 
veals Himself to man in history as the Supreme Power unto Righteous- 
ness, as the Educator and Father of His children, the whole human family. 

(b) In His grace and wisdom, God has appointed Israel to be His wit- 
nesses on earth, laying upon this priest-people obligation by its life to 
lead the world to the recognition of the truth that love and justice and 
righteousness are the only principles of conduct which can establish peace 
among men and fill man’s life with harmony besides conferring on man 
an imperturbable sense of worth and worthiness, independent of accidents 
of fortune or station. 

(c) This election of Israel confers no privilege on the Jew but imposes 
greater obligations. Every human being is God’s child called to lead and 
capable of leading a righteous life. 

(d) The dispersion of the Jews and the destruction of the Temple were 
not acts of providential requital for sins. They were providential devices 
for bringing Israel nearer unto other children of man. The goal of Israel’s 
history is not national restoration and segregation, but the rise of a more 
nearly perfect humanity in which Jewish love for God and man shall be 
universal. Not a Messiah but the Messianic age is the burden of Israel’s 
hope. 

(e) Reform Judaism rejects the doctrine of man’s innate sinfulness and 
this is true of all phases of Judaism.” Jew. Encyc., Vol. X., p. 350. 

* Yale Review, Oct. 22, pp. 87-99. 


216 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


It might now be conceded that there is a departure from the 
standards of the reform pulpit upheld in earlier decades. In 
{ew congregations is the pulpit apt to lead the congregation up 
the steep and rugged pathway of scholarship. In most instances 
the controlling factor is the social-center, and where this is not 
established, the religious school. It is not the pulpit that is the 
channel or vehicle of exposition and illumination. The pulpit 
should “engage one-tenth of the rabbi’s professional labor” says a 
bulletin of the Free Synagog, New York, and in this statement 
is concentrated the transition from the old to the new. 

Granting that these remaining nine-tenths of professional 
labor are valid, the preoccupations of the rabbi’s pulpit dis- 
courses have not been of the timber, temper and thesis of their 
predecessors who were German trained, university graduates 
and true to type. In their sermons they borrowed the technique 
of a university professor lecturing to a class, and thus presenting 
with all the objectivity of scholarship his thesis. This method 
was forced upon them by the nature of their problems: the 
announcement of the message of Judaism as construed by 
Reformers. Had these rabbis adhered to tradition in their ser- 
mons, these homilies would have been simple, self-evident ampli- 
fications of Biblical texts after the fashion of the “Midrashim,’?°® 
in which a platitudinous moral truism is verified by scripture. 
Or these might have been as innocuous as a sermonette delivered 
by an army chaplain. They could have been what in the pre- 
reform period characterized the sole sermon of the year that on 
the Sabbath previous to the Day of Atonement, an ethical admoni- 
tion of general application, or a detailed information bearing on 
the ritualism of the holiday.’ 


*® A collection of homiletic comments on Biblical Books. 


* The Targum of the Song of Songs, edited by H. Gollanz, is “mid- 
rashic” in method. It contains picturesque commentaries, the commen- 
tary having often little to do with the text. It is not unlikely a collect or 
digest of sermons delivered on verses of that text, viz.: Comment on 
verse. “Thy cheeks are comely with circlets (plaits) thy neck with strings 
of jewels,” 1:10 reads as follows, and is saturated with a sermonic essence: 
“Now when they (Children of Israel) went forth to the wilderness, the 
Lord spake unto Moses thus: ‘How ill adapted is this people, that I 
should give unto them the dictates of the Law, so that these might act 
as a bridle in their mouths, and they would not depart from the goodly 
path, just as the horse which has a bridle between its jaws does not de- 
part (from the way). And how fit is their neck to bear the yoke of my 
precepts, which would weigh upon them as the yoke upon the neck of the 
ox which ploughs in the field and supports himself and his master.’ ” 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 217 


But the reform pioneers were not reviving the midrashic 
methods of a “magid” or preacher. They were propagandists 
of a historical construction of Jewish destiny whose ambition 
was to make their congregations as intensely American as they 
were Jewish.** On them had fallen the mantle of the prophets 
who had faintly outlined a historico-philosophic destiny for 
Israel, viz: 

“And nations shall walk at thy light 

And kings at the brightness of thy rising.’—Is. 60:3. 
They were dedicated to a cause. Theirs was a mission to pre- 
sent the revelation of Israel’s appointment as a priest people 
serving at the altar of humanity, in contrast to the traditional 
version of an exiled people waiting for the hour of their recall to 
their ancient patrimony, which is the orthodox version, as has 
been shown. 

Furthermore, the new teachers of Judaism made emphatic 
the manifestation of God’s workings and his self-unfolding in 
history with particular reference to the singular part the Jew 
has played in making this unfolding of the spirit known. Hence, 
in explaining this thesis of Jewish destiny of their congrega- 
tions, the reform rabbis imposing on Israel a historico-philoso- 
phic destiny, adopted the methodology of their professors of 
the German universities, as befits the exposition of a providential 
career, rationally interpreted. 

It is no disparagement to these pathfinders and discoverers that 
they used the methods of research in laboratory and library. 
Granting that their methods were tedious, their investigations 
have saved American Jews alive from what would have other- 
wise been an intellectual famine. Our superficial age, often so 
muddled and befogged since it is fed on such mental pabulum 
as Sunday newspaper editorials, is impatient of these elaborate 
expositions of scholarly themes. Cleverness of phraseology 
seeks to hide the nakedness of ignorance. Entertainment, not 


““The Jewish sermon as developed by the great Jewish preachers of 
modern times, Kley, Salomon, Mannheimer, Holdheim, Philipson, Sachs, 
Einhorn, Hirsch, Geiger, Stein and Joel may be didactic or exhortative, 
historical or ethical, biblical, Talmudical, literary or philosophical, polem- 
ical or doctrinal, textual or topical, expository or parenetic, controversial 
or contemplative, but whatever its formal character may be, it conveys 
with moral earnestness, spiritual truth in forms of Jewish thought. The 
masters of modern Jewish pulpit oratory never doubted that the empha- 
sis upon spiritual truth is what distinguishes the Jewish sermon from the 
Jewish lecture or the Jewish essay.” Yr. Bk., CCHOREV 0133) pii16l: 


218 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


information, is often the objective of the modern pulpit and to 
“sive the people what they want,” the policy of this generation, 
as it was in the age that worshipped the golden calf. This, the 
complaint of older Rabbis. 

The sermons of the reform pioneers, appear ponderous, as for 
example, Samuel Hirsch on “Religion as Humanity.” But these 
sermons possess the virtue of scholarship. These old preachers 
approached their tasks with an awe’® inspired by a knowledge of 
the phenomenon they were called upon to interpret. 

In the later decades of the nineteenth century, the American 
Rabbis of German antecedents were aligned in a movement 
whose purpose was to enlarge the destiny of Israel beyond the 
confines of Canaan. Ultimately all humanity would become 
subject of their solicitude and as tenderly as the teachers of Juda- 
ism guard the followers of that tradition so tenderly, too, do 
they care and guard all children of man. Judaism had ceased 
to be an end unto itself and was the manifestation of a con- 
sciousness in the Jewish people that works for righteousness. 

These reform rabbis were opposed to an interpretation of Juda- 
ism stimulated by nascent also rampant nationalism, which 
would subordinate the religious intent of the Jew to the exi- 
gencies of a political program. In other words, they labored 
against a propaganda to dethrone Judaism as a religion and sub- 


* The propaganda of Reform Judaism consumed the later decades of 
the XIX and the early years of the XX century. Its message deliv- 
ered, reform congregations founded, there followed a period of fulfillment 
wherein congregations were functioning under the momentum of former 
propaganda with really no decisive program, outlook, object or incentive, 
save that fashioned by traditionally worshipping. The hiatus was painful. 
It was virtually the equivalent in a spiritual realm of a vacuum in the 
physical world. Nature abhors a vacuum wherever made. This gap had 
to be bridged. The first false structure reared to cross this chasm were 
social centers or the institutional synagog which in the vernacular of the 
market place means “introducing business in religion.” Business in re- 
ligion is a synonym of “doing things,” and doing things means organiza- 
tions: classes, clubs, sisterhoods, brotherhoods, parent meetings, eating, 
dancing, sewing—activity within the synagog proper or in annexes con- 
structed for that purpose. None of the extraneous activities introduced 
are dependent on the synagog for their perpetuity or actuality. All of 
them could be done elsewhere and have been ere the consciousness of a 
vacuum or hiatus suggested to some rabbis the need of opening the syn- 
agog daily for “doing things’: business, stenographers, clerks and the 
like. Religious organizations have come about in this age of transition to 
bridge a chasm. It is not one of the functions of religion to serve in this 
wise? The age now dawning calls for another stress and emphasis both 
in Judaism and the rabbi. 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 219 


stitute in place of religion a Jewish nationalism, revamped and 
revised after centuries of inaction as the Zionistic program 
implied and proposed.”° 

According to the nationalist, Palestine is the ultimate home of 
the Jew, and America a mere way-station on the trunk-line whose 
terminus is Jerusalem. With the possession of Palestine assured 
(however untenable need not figure in the bill) rabbinical Juda- 
ism of which nationalism is a legitimate offspring, can be ful- 
filled. Due to the dispersion of the Jews all over the world, the 
fulfillment of the Torah is suspended, said orthodoxy. The dia- 
spora in which the Jews are now cast is in the nature of an exile, 
the result of the multiplicity of sins which Israel has committed. 
Rabbinical Zionism did not work out the elaborate political plots 
and policies of modern Zionism. Sufficient for them the fact 
that during this period of exile the Jew is to prepare himself by 
deeds of loving kindness for the advent of the Messiah who in 
his might would lead the dispersed members of the congregation 
of Jacob back to “Ertz Yisroel,” i. e. the present mandate of the 
British Empire.*? 


*® The pivot of the opposition between Reform and Conservative Juda- 
ism is the conception of Israel’s destiny. Jewish orthodoxy looks upon 
Palestine not merely as the cradle but as the ultimate home of Judaism. 
With its possession is connected the possibilities of fulfilling the Law, 
those parts of divine legislation being unavoidably suspended that are con- 
ditioned by the existence of the Temple and by the occupation of the 
Holy Land. Away from Palestine the Jew is condemned to violate God’s 
will in regard to these. God gave the law. God decreed also Israel’s 
dispersion. To reconcile this disharmony between the demands of the 
Law and historically developed actuality the philosophy of orthodoxy 
regards the impossibility of observing the law as a divine punishment 
visited upon Israel on account of its sins. Israel is at the present moment 
in exile, it has been expelled from its land. The present period is thus 
one of probation. The length of its duration God alone can know and 
determine. Israel is doomed to wait patiently in exile, hoping and pray- 
ing for the Messiah who will lead the dispersed back to Palestine where 
Israel will be able to observe the letter of the law contained in the Pen- 
tateuch. Simultaneously with Israel’s redemption, justice and peace will 
be established among the dwellers on earth and the prophetic predictions 
will be realized in all their glories. J. En.,-Vol. X., p. 348. 


*™ Reform rabbis opposed political Zionism because it was inconsistent 
with Jewish destiny and contrary to the historic mission of the Jewish 
people. At no time were American Jews unmindful of the psychology of 
their European Jewish brothers who looked upon the Zionistic move- 
ment as their last refuge from the floods of barbarism. American Jews 
have been the staunchest advocates of practical restoration in Palestine 
for those bent on migrating there, whatever their motive or inclination. 
Zionism to many American Jews spells philanthropy and as such, support 


220 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


The reform rabbis insisted that the destiny of the Jew was not 
bound up in a return to Palestine but in an adjustment to the 
national life of the peoples among whom they dwell and in an 
acceptance of their political institutions. To them, the disper- 
sion of the Jews throughout all European countries was not a 
punishment. On the contrary, it is a glorious opportunity to 
spread the monotheistic ideal of God and Man’s conscious obli- 
gations of service unto his fellow-men in all ranks and stations 
of existence. To prepare the Jews for this service these teachers 
were initiated into the lore of their fathers. Judaism, they dis- 
covered, was not confined to Bible, Talmud, Midrash and cer- 
tainly not to the “Shulah Aruk,” alone, but it was a continuous 
revelation of the Jewish spirit coming to consciousness in all 
these documents. These teachers proved that Judaism is an his- 
torical growth; a process, not a product! Judaism, they said, is 
revealed in the constant endeavor to imitate God.” 


Researches into the origins of Judaism showed that growth is 
a characteristic of it as of all cultural forces. Judaism is con- 
stantly reshaping its ceremonial to express the expanding intent 
to duty, as is witnessed in the transformation of “Shabuoth,” 
or Feast of Weeks, from an agricultural festival to our modern 
Jewish Confirmation Day. But in every modification of cere- 
mony, it is incumbent on the Jewish people, grouping together 
as a result of the common memories of their historical experi- 
ences, to proclaim the love of man for man. In the pulpit of 
reform congregations the modern rabbis vindicate Israel’s role: 
“So long as there obtains hatred, so long as the Jew is held in 
derision and scorn for his religion, so long must the Jew continue 


it generously. But the Zionistic movement has taken a large toll of young 
men and women from the ranks of Reform Judaism. Now that this 
question has been partially solved on the political issue and the Pales- 
tinian Jews are British subjects—being in good hands even so—American 
Zionists are in the position of Othello—-they find their occupation gone 
and their occupation was mass-meetings; collecting shekels, haranguing 
Reform Jews and starting Hebrew newspapers. 


“7 eaving behind him his old home, the temple, and its sacrificial cult, 
the pomp of the secerdotal services; giving up the symbolism of the age 
of his preparation for his larger historic duty; he marched forth to found 
everywhere temples of a truer worship and a deeper knowledge of God 
and to lead by his self-sacrificing devotion all mankind to the spiritual 
altar of atonement. He was both priest and sacrifice, sent out like the 
sacrificial goat in the old ritual into the desert, taking the sins of all 
men upon his own shoulders and carrying them away.” Services for the 
Afternoon of the Day of Atonement. Einhorn Prayer Book, p. 198. 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 221 


to teach and preach that without the love of God and man— 
the individual, however great, is powerless. Therefore modern 
Jews refuse to reject their religion or anticipate salvation by 
means of a national restoration. Hence, the coming of a per- 
sonal Messiah, as entertained by orthodox was discarded, and 
in its stead the vigorous preachment of love, justice and service 
in this world here and now.”* 


These and allied doctrines demanded a unique advocacy. They 
could not be enforced by ecclesiastical action such as prevailed 
on the Kahal of Russia-Poland in previous centuries. The organi- 
zation of Polish Jewry of that era was favorable to the creation 
of a sanhedrional authority. There is nobody in this country 
legally invested to sanction ceremonial or discard ritual. The 
only authority recognized here is the justification of reason. 
Right is not upheld by might. Right is upheld by scholarship.*4 
The action taken by Holdheim, Geiger, in Europe, Samuel 


* The pioneer reform rabbis of the United States were propagandists, 
using that word honorably. They were special pleaders, partisans of 
their cause which had then ample justification. To censure them for rigid 
iconoclasms in behalf of “Reform Theory” (Bulletin of the N. Shore Con- 
gregation, Winnetka, Ill., Vol. I., No. 7) traduces them, since they were 
motivated by a noble ambition, namely, to convert the Jew from a nar- 
row legalistic sect into an American citizen actuated by his prophetic an- 
cestry and historic mission to become one with them in fostering the 
welfare of their commonwealth. Equal with Israel’s bond of fellowship to 
“other Jewish groups throughout the world” is Israel’s duty to humanity 
as exhibited in his fellow citizens in these United States with whom he is 
to labor to the end that he and they be lifted to the high station of free- 
dom and responsibility which is the goal set by Jewish idealism as the 
common lot of man by virtue of his kinship with God, who is, according 
to Jewish conception, the Father of all mankind. 


24 The presentation of the universal revelation of religion enforced on 
the teachers of the Jewish religion the necessity of being students not only 
of their own historic growth but of other religious systems. The Jew 
ought to know the outstanding professions of the daughter religions, 
Christianity and Mohammedanism. The teacher of the Jewish religion 
(professionally and in a technical sense, the rabbi) needs the background 
of comparative religions and folk-lore, as well as psychology, philosophy 
and theology in order to adequately explain the phenomenology of his own 
Jewish religion. Thus he can rationally explain how God works in sun- 
dry ways His wonders to unfold. To answer the skeptical inquirer was 
a piece of rabbinic prudence. As Torah is one of the pillars upholding the 
world, Torah equivalenting scholarship, culture, as well as morality and 
religion,—so the Jewish teacher has become perforce a student, and his 
scholarship seeps through into his sermons. To a sermon of this type, 
Judaism historically and traditionally is more inclined than the emotional 
gibberish and balderdash of “spirituality,” which aims to putrify Judaism 
by unwholesome emotional excitations. 


222 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


Hirsch, E. G. Hirsch, Samuel Adler, I. M. Wise, Max Landsberg, 
K. Kohler, and many other leading minds of Reform Judaism was 
fortified by precedents revealed in Jewish literature. Filled with 
the knowledge of Jewish science, these reform rabbis and those 
who followed in their path, acquainted their congregations with 
the reasonableness of their claims in their pulpit discourses and 
editorials. 

The Reform Movement was not a matter of convenience nor 
even an aftermath of the “Golath,” but a resultant of scientific 
research. The neo-chassidim being nurtured in orthodox Juda- 
ism, insist that the Torah is a divine revelation and the Jewish 
religion a matter of fulfillment of all commandments, given at 
one epochal moment. Reform Judaism proved that all cere- 
monials are man made— some of them borrowed from faiths 
antagonistic to Judaism, (Zoroastrianism) and always the com- 
mon rights of all earth-born children.” 

It is not the ceremonial therefore, but the intent which counts. 
If the ceremonial has no longer a message and a meaning there 
is every justification for abrogating it. So the pioneer rabbis of 
reform reasoned. But their boldness is censured today. There 
is often a revival of abolished practices. As in Sinai, Chicago, 
reviving Saturday services. 

There was strenuous objection against the spoken word in 
the pulpit®® as an innovation when these were proposed in the 


25 “The researches of more recent years in the domain of Biblical litera- 
ture have enabled the successors of these earlier Reformers to apply to the 
Bible and Pentateuch the principles applied by their predecessor to rab- 
binical literature. The Pentateuch is not the work of one period. Pen- 
tateuchal legislation also is the slow secretion of centuries. The original 
content of Judaism does not consist in the Law and its institutions, but in 
the ethical monotheism of the Prophets. Legalism is, according to this 
view, originally foreign to Judaism. It is an adaptation of observances 
found in all religions and which therefore is not originally or specifically 
Jewish. The legalism of Ezra had the intentions and the effect of sepa- 
rating Israel from the world. This separation is today a hindrance, not 
a help to carrying out of the Jewish mission. The Jew must seek the 
world in order to make his ethical religion a vital influence therein.” 
There is also recognition of the psychology of ceremonials. Certain laws 
and institutions have in course of time, due to bitter persecution, taken 
on new significance. They are associated in Jewish consciousness with 
loyalty unto death in the face of apostacy, prejudice and oppression. Af. 
BA feViali iw ayipa G97: 

* During the mediaeval period preaching was not so general, in Ger- 
many and France, as among Sephardim. Terrible persecutions and the 
internal social distress suffered by the Jews so depressed their spirits 
they had neither ears nor inclination for sermons, Added to this an ever- 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 223 


early decades of the Nineteenth Century. The researches of 
Zunz proved the antecedents of the sermon.2* The use of the 
vernacular in connection with worship was bitterly opposed. 
But the Reform rabbis showed that there was a precedent for 
this in the observation of their ancient colleagues who said that 
the use of the word, “Hear” in Israel’s watchword, “Hear, O 
Israel, the Lord is our Eternal, the Lord alone,” indicated that 
both God and man were supposed to “hear and understand” 
what was said in the course of worship, hence a worshipper was 
permitted to use a language which he understood.?8 


But even this usage of modern speech” in the synagogs, not 
to mention family pews, organ, the abolition of calling up mem- 
bers®*® of the congregation when the weekly pericope of the 
Pentateuch is read; the sale of mizvoth (honors) in connection 
with the reading of this section or Sidra,** (the weekly portion), 
the removal of hats, (still a subject of controversy), mixed choir 
and modern prayer-books were each and all subjects that precip- 
itated terrific struggles and were and still remain causes that 
split congregations into factions. 


In treating these ceremonials the rabbis were constrained to 
apply scientific methods of analysis and criticism prevailing in 
university circles. There sermon discourses were the leading 
method of advocacy. In these they presented their justification 
for Reform Judaism. Their views were accepted because they 


increasing attention paid to “pilpulistic dialectics” of the Talmud. These 
hair-splitting arguments engrossed the interest of the rabbis to the exclu- 
sion of all else. Three times a year the rabbi spoke: On the Sabbath 
before Passover, on the Sabbath of Repentance, and on the Eve of the 
Day of Atonement. 

* Opus: Cit, 

** Sermons, in our understanding of the word, trace from the era of Ezra 
who instituted the practice of reading a portion of the law on the Sab- 
bath. An interpreter translated or paraphrased the text, hence our Tar- 
gums. From this developed the practice of preaching. There is common 
agreement that the prophets are the forerunners of the preacher. The 
prophetic addresses, though not an official religious institution, were the 
earliest sermons, 

”“The Torah always speaks in the language of the sons of men.” 
Berekoth, 33b. 

*® This practice, which often leads to absurdity, is being revived. Phari- 
saic in origin, it illustrates the democratic nature of Judaism and the dis- 
inclination of the revelation to foster a priestly caste. The whole con- 
gregation is worthy of priestly rank. This intent is not stressed in its 
revival, merely the ceremony is such for its own sake. 

31 Not yet revived. But pass auf! 


224 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


were true and right and responded to the dwelling spirit of the 
Jewish people who found God, not in the annals of ancient reve- 
lations alone, but in the editorials, sermons, articles, books of 
men and women who are alive this day. The seers of our own 
glorious era are also factors of divine revelation. 

Again and again the reform rabbis insisted that Judaism is not 
static as the neo-chassidim claim, but a continuous unfolding 
of the spirit of man seeking to find God through service to man- 
kind,*? and impressing the spirit of God on the things of earth. 

The transplanting of the reform movement from Germany, 
where it originated as has been shown, to America, proved to be 
a further illustration of that historical growth to which Judaism 
has alway been subjected. This is not to say that this process 
of expansion in Judaism could not have occurred elsewhere. 
German Jews migrated to other countries in modern times: 
South Africa, Brazil, Australia, for instance ;3* but in none of 
those countries did a type of Jewish religion corresponding to 
Judaism in America evolve. American political and economic 
life aided the liberation of the universal and prophetic elements 
from the clutches of Talmudism and exploded the notion that 
the discharging of a fixed quantity of commandments, number- 
ing 613, privileges the Jew to “cleave unto God” and forget to 
vote. 

Judaism as the reform rabbis construed it, cleaves to the 
firm belief that this world and humanity are under the guidance 
of God who revealed Himself to man in history as a cosmic force 
or “urge,” towards righteousness, and man fashioned after the 


“This thought is contained in many variations in the modern Jewish 
prayer book, particularly in Einhorn’s “Olath Tamid.” Earning one’s 
daily bread is not a curse laid upon one, is the drift of this prayer, for 
“he that eateth the fruit of his hands is accounted blessed.” Both Sabbath 
rest and seasons of work are holy covenants since man is born in free- 
dom and shackled by the gyves of the self. “Unto freedom didst Thou 
call man, to be the ruler of Thine earth as Thou art the Lord of all 
creation. Not by the sting of want nor by the goad of greedy ambition 
shall our hands be quickened but by the recognition that as we hold from 
Thee our being, we must so profit life’s opportunities as to impress Thy 
‘Spirit upon the things of earth within and without us and shape them to 
the higher uses of the divinity which Thou hast breathed upon our mortal 
clay.” Eng. Translation, p. 38. 

™There are congregations in all these countries. But none are “re- 
form.” Usually the dominion congregations pattern after British con- 
servatism, which the English Jews seem proud to appropriate for their 
Judaism and are extremely conservative, that is, legalistic, rabbinical and 
unprogressive. 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 225 


“image of God” partakes of this and other Godly qualities. All 
human beings are heirs to this urge which is an indwelling of God 
in the soul of man. He impressed all things on earth with the 
stamp of this divine attribute. To interpret this process of cleav- 
ing unto the ethical ideals associated with God who identifies 
and symbolizes them, has Israel been appointed. He is there- 
fore God’s “witness on earth.” He has believed and trusted 
in God and assumed the mission of teaching God everywhere, 
which is the implication of this concept. 

In that light has he seen the light of his priestly selection. His 
business is therefore not a political adventure but vastly nobler 
and more difficult. By means of his life, he is called upon to 
lead men to a recognition of the truth that love, justice and 
righteousness are the principles of conduct. The practice of 
these attributes can establish peace among men and fill their 
lives with harmony. He who serves his humanity and imparts 
a sense of worth and worthiness to his own existence rises above 
the accidents of fortune. He lends himself to a constructive 
cause: Child labor, the abolition of natural monopolies, collec- 
tive bargaining, managerial control, co-operation and mutual aid 
in various economic and social aspects are all expressions of this 
role in which one gives himself for the welfare of his fellows. 
A national state, fictitiously transmitted from remote antiquity 
is not essential for the discharge of this service. On the con- 
trary, the loss of Palestine, and with it the Temple of Jerusalem, 
was not a requital for sin, but a providential design to bring 
the Jewish people in closer contact with their humanity. 

The Jews are illustrating that program in this country to good 
effect since the arch foes of American Jews have thus far been 
unable to instigate the American people against their fellow 
citizens of Jewish faith. 

The impatience of youthful America with all tradition, 
whether religious, political, economic or scientific, may have 
aided the wide acceptance of Reform Judaism in the early 
decades. According to this construction, Judaism was shown 
to be universal in outlook and application, while national and 
even tribal in origin. The Reform Jews urge upon various 
groups loyalty to this vision and particularly to America. Mark 
the initiation ceremony of the Independent Order B’nai B’rith* 


** The initiation lecture into the Independent Order B’nai Brith contains 
the following paragraph: “The red and white and blue combined are 


226 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


(no longer a secret fraternity) as a case in point. An ideal of 
social righteousness, as the ultimate goal of all humanity was 
set up by Reform Judaism as the far off divine event of the 
human race. “Grant peace and life unto us and all dwellers on 
this earth,’ they quoted from their prayers in justification of 
this aspiration, that in the later days, God would be One and so 
acknowledged by all humanity.*° No Jewish service was com- 
plete without concluding with this prayer, (the “Alenu”), which 
reads in part: “O God, we hope to behold the glorification of 
Thy majesty, to witness the gladsome time when Thy kingdom, 
embracing all worlds, will be acknowledged everywhere, when 
selfishness will no longer be on earth, when all children of flesh 
will invoke Thy name and all the wicked will turn toward Thee.” 
Olath Tamid, p. 39 (Eng. translation). 

Thus the destiny of the American Jew becomes an imitation 
of the “servant of the Lord” motif, the Aved Yaweh** idealized 


emblematic of the flag under whose protecting folds we meet; the stand- 
ard of that land which sheltering Israel, has been shielded by the God of 
Nations. 

“Mindful of the blessings which we enjoy in common with our fellow 
citizens, let us, with loyal hearts, be ever devoted to our land of Civil and 
Religious liberty. 

“Next unto the duties which we owe to Him to whom we now bow in 
reverence is the duty which we, as citizens of a free land, owe to that 
government wherein our rights are established and our liberties made 
secure. 

“Thus you (addressing the candidate) receive the second lesson we 
teach—the first being righteousness, faithfulness and loving kindness— 
is that of Patriotism and Loyalty to our country.” p. 31. 

* “According to the teachings of Judaism, as expounded in Jewish cate- 
chisms, every man is God’s child and therefore the brother of every other 
man. There is in the Yalkut (midrashic commentary to Deuteronomy), 
paragraph 286, this comment, “God used the phrase ‘I am Yaweh, thy 
God,’ advisedly because He was the God of every individual: man, woman 
or child.” 


* “The problem of suffering especially that of the servant of God occu- 
pied the Jewish mind since the Babylonian exile. Israel is called to 
testify to his God among all the peoples and is thus the Servant of the 
Lord, the atoning sacrifice for the sins of mankind, from whose bruises 
healing is come to all the nations and who arouses all humanity to a 
deeper spiritual vision. Israel is the champion of the Lord, chosen to 
battle and suffer for the supreme values of mankind, for freedom and 
justice, truth and humanity, the man of woe and grief, whose blood is to 
fertilize the soil with the seeds of righteousness and love for mankind. 
From the days of Pharaoh to the present day every oppressor of the Jews 
has become the means of bringing greater liberty to a wider circle, for the 
God of Israel, the Hater of bondage, has been appealed to in behalf of 
freedom in the old world and the new. Every hardship that made life 





ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 227 


by the Babylonian Isaiah. They were obligated by historical 
duty to illustrate this law of love. Either miraculously or by 
providential design, the Jew is the solvent of freedom in the 
world. Conscious that as American Jews they were free to 
serve men they became imbued with the belief that they were 
soldiers in the welfare of their commonwealth, no less than 
martyrs to liberty, loyalty and economic justice. They were 
drafted to hasten the advent of peace, prosperity and fair play 
among all their fellow-citizens. Their ideal, it is clearly noted, 
was and still remains religious. It was beyond politics, and 
therefore supercivic, and imposed on all who are born of Jewish 
parents, the duty to lend themselves for the good of all and not 
for his personal well-being alone. By reason of their Jewish 
birthright, all Jews are recipients of this warrant. This histori- 
cal duty calls each to serve their fellow American, and partici- 
pate with them in continuing the traditions of the founding 
fathers to the end that not only political but economic justice 
may be established. F 

It is clear that the immigrants who sought these shores in 
the later decades of the nineteenth century came under the 
influence of Reform Judaism, which in a rudimentary state was 
imparted to them in their native land. These newcomers found 
it so well mated to democracy that this version became the 
readiest vehicle for the expression of their American religious 
philosophy, and they fostered it for the propagation of their 
beliefs. They were proud of the religious spirit of the Pilgrims 
with whom they enjoyed spiritual kinship and the liberal drafts 
made on the Old Testament for scriptural sanctions of 
government.** 

Reform Judaism thrives best in a democracy whose offspring 
it is, because the aims of democracy is to release man from the 
trammels of authority, and so to enhance the worth of the indi- 
vidual that he discharge the better his service to humanity 


unbearable to the Jew became a road to humanity’s triumph over bar- 
barism. All the injustice and malice which hurled their bitter shafts 
against Israel led ultimately to the greater victory of right and love. So 
all the waves of hatred and fanaticism that beat against the Jewish people 
served only to impress the truth of monotheism, coupled with sincere love 
of God and man, more deeply upon all hearts and to consign hypocrisy 
and falsehood to eternal contempt. Such is the belief confidently held by 
the people of God and ever confirmed anew by the history of the ages.” 
Jewish Theology, by Kohler, p. 375 sqq. 
37 Roger Williams, by Oscar Straus. 


228 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


through the freer exercise of his genius. American Democracy 
seeks to instill in the consciousness of each citizen a recognition 
of personal responsibility for the realization of his own career. 
Whatever effort is put forth by the individual, he finds himself 
as a rule aided as in the case of the repentant, as reported in 
Talmud. “He who comes to be cleansed is helped by Heaven.”** 
This is the American attitude. So in upbuilding his career here, 
every assistance is accorded the American citizen to realize 
himself and attain his goal. Even hard times do not eliminate 
this disposition from the soul of Americans. Of his own accord, 
every one must improve his own opportunities in the realizing 
of which he enriches the commonwealth. This is as good a 
democratic as it is a Jewish doctrine: whatever we have is but 
lent to us, a treasure for which we must give an account unto 
God, is the Jewish phrasing of this concept of partnership in 
the welfare of the state and its functioning.®® The thesis of 
Judaism is the social welfare of humanity, and the proposition 
of American democracy is the service of self in behalf of the 
state. The mutual interaction of American democracy with the 
paralleling ideals of Judaism made Reform cease to be an end in 
itself, as it had been under rabbinism, and become a motivation 
directing the individual Jew and Jewess to socialize their labors 
and endeavors for the common weal. 

The preoccupations of the reform pioneer, such as the con- 
troversies over curtailment of ritual and ceremonials, Sabbath- 
Sunday observance, dietary laws, etc., no longer intrigue the 
host of American Jews.*° Several factors conspired to produce 
this sterilization of interest in the religious manifestations of 
the Jewish group. The recrudescence of nationalism is one but 
not a conclusive explanation. For better or for worse, there 
are more Jews in this country concerned in Zionistic nationalism 
than in the religion of the Jewish people, as expounded by the 
Reform leaders in the Nineteenth century, which the Chief 
Rabbi of Engla.id (Dr. J. H. Hertz) stigmatizes as a “German- 
American mutation.” He and the majority of Jews resident in 
this country exalt Zionism above the religion of Jews and look 


SOMA soa: 

* Union Prayer Book, 66 sqq. 

“To what fanatical ends this controversy may lead, recall the Geiger- 
Tiktin affair in “The Reform Movement in Judaism,” pp. 72-99, This 
instance is typical of the conflict in Germany and later in this country. 
Some congregations are still wrangling over these inconsequential items. 


a 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 229 


upon Zionism as the fulfillment of their mission. Against this 
consummation of the Jewish people the reform preachers pro- 
test, saying: “Above nations stands humanity, and humanity is 
synonymous with Judaism.’ 

The attitude of the Reform Rabbis in reference to Zionism 
has been explained in full. It would surely be a supererogation 
to say that Zionists outnumber non-Zionists, despite the modi- 
fications in the political aspects of this movement in recent days. 
Even at the risk of redundancy, it must be said that the tre- 
mendous following of Zionists accounts in part for the stoppage 
in the religious development of Reform Judaism. Why in part? 
Because religion occupies the smallest fraction of men’s concern. 
In the main, the things that engross attention are matters of 
livelihood. Whatever thought accorded matters religious by 
whomsoever it has been done, was devoted to organizing 
religious enterprises: Reform Judaism had been fulfilled. Its 
labor was finished. There were no new paths to blaze, no new 
fields to till. Lest it utterly retrograde of stagnate organiza- 
tions were multiplied to increase activities and assume a vitality 
if none existed.*? 


There is in some quarters a positive denial that the religion 
of American Judaism is purposeful. According to an editor of 
the Hebrew Standard, Reform Judaism “disgusts the true Jew 
by its innovations, its iconoclasms, its departures from all hal- 


““Today no democracy is possible in America except a specialized 
democracy, which conceives of society as a whole and not as a more or 
less adventitious assemblage of myriads of individuals. The old individ- 
ualistic system pictured the individual freely bargaining with the state, not 
only in a mythical social contract, but in the every day affairs of taxation 
and governmental expenditure. For so much protection the individual 
would pay the state so much taxes. * * * The individualistic point of view 
halts social development at every point—Why should those wo do not use 
the public parks and playgrounds pay for them in taxes? To the individ- 
ualist, taxation above what is absolutely necessary for the individual’s 
welfare is an aggression upon his rights and a circumscription of his pow- 
ers—the democracy toward which we are striving emphasizes social rather 
than merely individual aims and carries over its ideals from the political 
into the industrial and social fields.” The New Democracy, by Walter 
E. Weyl, 163. 

“Sporadic attempts are made to revive discarded ceremonials such as 
the Kiddush in the North Shore Congregation, Winnetka, otherwise a 
very radical congregation. Beth Israel, Houston, Texas, has revived en 
toto all the ceremonials connecting with the obscure celebration of the 
Rejoicing over the Law. 


230 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


lowed traditions.’’** Many of the nationalists exhibit a brutal 
and violent intolerance towards those whose views and opinions 
of Judaism clash with their own political nationalism. Many 
Zionists refuse to hear Reform Judaism explained at all. Accord- 
ing to their notion, there is only one aspect of Judaism, and 
they, like Mohammed, in reference to his revelation, are the 
sole prophets of Jewish destiny. Reform Rabbis have been in 
some instances labelled or libelled “Benedict Arnolds” for oppos- 
ing a recognition of the Balfour Declaration on the part of the 
United States, saying as Dr. Philipson has said repeatedly, 
that the Jews are a religious people, not a nation. But the 
religious destiny of the Jews of America is the concern of a 
minority. To them the Jewish religion is the unfolding in them 
of the spirit of God, the identification of themselves with those 
attributes associated with deity and the fulfilling in conduct 
of whatever abides in ampler measure in God. There is imposed 
on the Jew the duty of so directing his life that his fellow beings 
may obtain increased devotion to those duties of love and fellow- 
ship. No one born into a Jewish home, of Jewish parents, is 
exempt from special obligations of superior conduct of disci- 
plining his mind and soul and hands that he give of his wealth, 
his talent and strength. This is the gist of the reform preach- 
ment, 

There is a deplorable reaction evident in the reform synagogs 
which fear the sequence of this message: a hesitancy to hazard 
a new venture is condoned by reviving a discarded ceremonial 
on the assumption that an old ceremonial will unite the modern 
group with other Jewish groups which is more important than 
attacking a new problem. Social justice and industrialism are 
new situations, and the pulpits of reform congregations will 
soon echo the moral indignation of their prophetic ancestors 
(who lashed the despoilers of their people), in accordance with 
the spirit of the social justice platform of the Central Conference 
of American Rabbis and the prayer for quickening social con- 
science inserted in the revised edition of the Union Prayer Book 
for the Day of Atonement. It will needs be constrained to 
register the ideals of love and justice upheld by the Jewish 
religion or jeopardize its future. The value of the pulpit increases 
in proportion to the vigor, courage, and idealism of the rabbi. 
~ “Reform (Judaism) disgusts the true Jew by its innovations, its icono- 


elasms, its departures from hallowed traditions. ” Hebrew Standard, Oct. 
27, 1922. 


ae nego 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 231 


If the pulpit is without vision, it, too, will perish as does that 
nation which no longer looks aloft to a far horizon. The reform 
pulpit can not continue a colorless existence. It must be more 
than merely religious if it is to meet the challenge that it is a 
“Rich Man’s Church.” Economic questions are too often 
eschewed although not entirely. For no rabbi can trace spirit- 
ual filiation to Micah, Amos and Jeremiah and seal his ears to 
the cry of distress. Yet there are congregations that do muzzle 
their rabbi’s pulpit utterances and compel him to limit the range 
of his pulpit topics to “religion.” This inuendo means that he, 
at the risk of retaining “his job” must forego politics, economics, 
or any other vitally human topic in which men are personally 
involved. Religion is suggested as safe and sound because 
religion might concentrate attention on heaven, or impersonal 
matters affecting nobody. 


There are congregations that assume the right to control the 
spoken message of their pulpit. This is not even a secret. Yet 
these restrictions have deflated the former prestige of the pulpit 
so that today it appears more decorative than dynamic. Its 
prophetic ardor has departed. What might have been a function 
of conscience and a quickening thereof has become a formalism 
of respectability. Services are attended not for inspiration but 
entertainment. Emphasis is placed on attendance. Sisterhoods 
and Brotherhoods stress attendance. The strain and artificiality 
of this appeal does not protrude, and yet it is there, in these 
pleas for attendance. Traditionally one recited the regulation 
benedictions in company as a rule with his group. This insis- 
tence was not stimulated by organized means, but was a duty 
laid upon every son of the covenant. The insistence was aimed 
on reciting the benedictions which were to enter into the con- 
science of the worshipper. The modern stress is on the physical 
presence of the worshipper. His personal presence betokens 
commercial aspects, proving that “the thing pays because it 
draws.” And this is directly in violation of the Jewish spirit 
which strove to implant in each worshipper an attitude of 
“Kewanna” or consecration, the outcome and resultant of this 
service which substituted the more gross and primitive sacri- 
ficial cults. 

A state of arrested development now characterizes the religion 


of the Jewish people here. This may be due to an attitude of 
introspection attending on their age-long misery and their Zion- 


232 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


ism. But a tendency to look eastward rather than westward 
has been the posture of the majority. The prolonged back- 
ward glance over travelled roads has sterilized inspiration and 
arm-strung initiative. The type of Jewish religion most favored 
in this country in recent years is ritualistic, nationalistic, and 
pietistic, each status a replica of previous types, none of which 
are progressive, or responsive to the prophetic appeal for right 
doing and right living. 

In the path of this reaction trailed myriads of newcomers from 
Eastern Europe who were unfamiliar with their historical des- 
tiny as Reform Judaism had expounded it. The immigrant was 
mightily concerned in establishing himself as the first economic- 
ally essential element of his existence. He could give no thought 
to his religion, granting that he observed it. Some of the new 
arrivals did not even revere their own heritage nor respect 
themselves as Jews, but among other devices of degradation 
announced dances on the eve of Yom Kippur thus desecrating 
‘the holiest of days in the calendar of the synagog. Whatever 
type of Judaism the immigrant observed was a variant of 
orthodox. Reform Judaism has not made sufficient inroads in 
Russia despite the “Haskalah” to effect any modification in the 
rigidity of rabbinism.44 The new arrival was in no mood to 
entertain a vision of his religion which enlisted him in a service 
for humanity. . The cruelty*® meted out to him in the old world 
he fancied abided here, and to an extent this is true, but in a 
different field. Religious tolerance is a rare boon. Whether 
religious tolerance offsets the ferocious struggle for exist- 


“Moses Leib Lilienblum, 1843-1910, and Jacob Gordon had each in their 
way advocated the reform of Judaism. Lilienblum felt convinced that 
dominant rabbinism in its mediaeval phase did not represent the true 
essence of Judaism. Reform Judaism appeared to him as an evolution. 
Just as the Talmud had once reformed Judaism in accordance with the 
requirements of its time, so must Judaism be reformed by us in accordance 
with the demands of our own time. Perez Smolenskin (1842-1885) op- 
posed it in favor of nationalism, the cult of Hebrew as a national lan- 
guage, and the messianic dogma as one of the symbols of national unity. 
History of the Jews in Russia and Poland, by Dubnow, Vol. II., 236 seq. 

* Literature produced by the American school of Jewish writers, Yid- 
dish and English, such as Anzia Yezierska, Bertha Pearl, Abraham Cahan, 
Morris Rosenfeld and scores of other remarkably talented authors, reflect 
this grinding poverty. Here in the land of liberty and opportunity the 
immigrant, during his probationary period, continues his unrelenting, inex- 
orable misery. In desperation he cleaved to God while he eked out his 
pe existence in Europe. Here his impoverishment forces him to deny 

od. 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 2338 


ence that waylays the immigrant is open to argument. 
The immigrant may not differentiate between persecution, a 
political weapon, and the struggle for existence, an economic 
weapon. Driven to desperation by the taskmaster of a sweat- 
shop or the knout of a Cossack offers no choice. Exploitation, 
brutality, discrimination, is his lot here the first years of his 
sojourn in the land of the free and the home of the brave.*° 

If sympathy is imagination at work, then it is easy to under- 
stand why the Jews of Eastern Europe are nursing the ambition 
to rebuild the city of David: it would mean release from the 
lash of the oppressor as an economic taskmaster. But imagin- 
ation is not so alert to enable one to understand why American- 
born Jews or those descendants of German sires have ceased 
to dream dreams of Judaism expanding in this country. It may 
be these sons and daughters of German Reform Jews belong 
to those whose lot has fallen in pleasant places. They are 
cursed with self-satisfaction and smug contentment. The pres- 
ent era of American Jews is one of arrested development, There 
is a void in the programs and projects of American Judaism at 
present. Being without a definite plan and lacking imagination 
enough to foresee and forecast better things and programs than 
we now have, it has become static, formal, futile. 

Reform rabbis are conscious of this emptiness and are striv- 
ing to stir the stagnant waters with a rod of social adjuncts and 
religious enterprises, thus purifying the streams that feed the 
wells of salvation. Hence, the type of rabbi who was formerly 
a teacher is being replaced by a type whose chiefest work is 
social activities, entertainments, clubs and classes. The province 
that formerly belonged to the sexton or, the Schammus, to use 
the word familiarly spoken in Jewish circle, is now preempted 
by the rabbi who has assumed the employments, menial and 
muscular, that were formerly performed by the Schammus. In 
other words, the rabbi of reform temples is now a sublimated 
Schammus, or a subordinate sexton. The most glowing tribute 
that can be paid to his endeavors is the statement that he is 


“© Morris Rosenthal was among the first to give poetic expression to the 
horrors of the sweat shop. His “Yiddisher Mai,” the Jewish May, aroused 
public sentiment and exposed artistically a condition that Jacob Reis in 
his “How the Other Half Live” brought into prominence in an earlier 
generation. Yiddish literature and American Jewish novelists, viz.: A. 
Cahan, Anzia Yezierska, Bertha Pearl and others set their characters 
against the background of the most sordid and grinding poverty in a 
brutally materialistic atmosphere. 


234 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


an organizer, a go-getter, a “good mixer.” Of his most eloquent 
discourse, whenever that happens, the highest compliment 
vouchsafed is the complacent critique, “that it was nice.” 

In those instances where the modern reform synagog has 
departed from the policy obtaining in the synagog of the Nine- 
teenth Century, its pulpit has become secondary; the function 
of the service and the office of rabbi is transferred from that 
of teacher of the laws of righteousness into that a of a “social 
worker,” using that current label technically.47. The fundamental 
function of the reform rabbi of this generation is not to instruct 
his people in the destiny of Judaism, as the reform rabbis insisted 
last century, and their particular duty as Jew in the social 
economy. ‘The business of the rabbi now is to be “practical.” 
His synagog is now “a business,” that is, without imagination 
or vision, and must be conducted on “business principles” 
wherein things are bought and sold on the quid pro quo basis. 
He is expected to “sell religion,’ as merchandise. Hence, in 
the effort to merchandise the message of the spirit (an ill-mated 
and incomparable function) the modern rabbi engages in a sub- 
terfuge of commerce: he offers a substitute, a commodity that is 
is “just as good” and these are religious enterprises. The traffic 
of the American rabbinate is organizations: clubs for men and 
clubs for women; clubs for boys and clubs for girls. <A little 
club here and a little club there. Here a club, there a club; 
an orgy of clubs and organizations.*® 

There are even evidences that religion is no longer considered 


“proper.” Religion is regarded as medicine and the bitterness 

“Intimate Glimpses of a Rabbi’s Career, p. 138, sqq. 

““Extra-synagogal activities are now attached to every congregation. 
These may be study classes for adults, sewing classes for women, theat- 
ricals like the Work Shop of B’nai Jeshurun of Cincinnati, Sinai, Chicago, 
and others. These activities are integral parts of the synagog and have 
always characterized it. A synagog exclusively devoted to prayer is as 
unJewish as one exclusively given over to extra congregational activities. 
Israel Abraham’s Jewish Life in Middle Age describes the range of activi- 
ties encompassed by the synagogs during that period and these corre- 
spond to the clubs and classes now in vogue. The one exception is to be 
noted, and that is the focusing of “mitzvoth” or good deeds on the rabbi. 
In the United States, reform Jews now abstract their charity and appoint 
the rabbi as their representative to “call” officially on those in distress, in 
sickness, in want of body or soul. In former eras each Jew considered 
himself appointed to visit the sick and feed the hungry, as it were. This 
function is now delegated to the rabbi in the name of his congregation, 
who regard his sick calls as the envoy of the congregation, “his most 
useful and necessary duty” as rabbi of the congregation. 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 235 


of the medication is eliminated by styling the pulpit discourse 
a “spiritual message.” What formerly passed as religion is now 
delegated to the field of charity. “To do charity” is the totality 
of religion, according to many American Jews, even as “to do 
good” summarized the religion of Tom Paine, who is to some 
as heroic as Elisha Ben Abuyah of Talmudic fame. Where the 
sermon is not under the immediate control of the Board of 
Trustees the synagog is under the control of the common-place, 
and trite. The sermon is seldom intended to awaken within 
the hearer a divine discontent. It is merely a perfunctory 
annunciation of trite phrases, pronounced in a Bishop’s voice, 
with a view of pleasing the few who came to be amused and 
not aroused, 


The modern rabbi, in fact, no longer prides himself on his 
pulpit discourse. His pride is fed by the various “activities” 
he has launched. Published statements of congregations tabu- 
late the “activities” with incidental references to the pulpit. The 
congregation bulletins show that a series of dignified and refined 
entertainments have been arranged for the season. Among some 
of the features offered are lectures given by men prominent in 
public life, especially in politics. Their lectures are as a rule 
revamped statements of obvious economic conditions, such as 
the support of an eight-hour working day, child labor; old age 
or mother’s pensions, or any other quasi-liberal economic doc- 
trine that will not offend the canons of the average business man. 


Often lectures are devoted to art or literature in which case 
the speaker may illustrate his “talk” and thus afford additional 
entertainment to the audience. Congregations fortunate in 
possessing a grand organ are providing organ recitals—particu- 
larly on Sunday evening. 


There are in addition innumerable clubs, formed for boys and 
girls. The investiture of a girls’ scout troop in a large Ohio con- 
gregation was announced in bold face type in a recent congrega- 
tional circular as an event of tremendous consequence. It is no 
uncommon occurrence for a congregation of two hundred mem- 
bers to have four clubs for boys and girls alone. These clubs 
are endeavoring to train the hand as well as head, body as well 
as soul. Thus the synagog of modern America comes to resem- 
ble an institution. It boasts of being a “busy place;” “Activity” 
is its slogan; and “something doing all the time” is the motto 
engraven in largest letters over its portals, like a Chautauqua 


236 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


center during camp meeting season. The synagog that was closed 
six days in the week, or five, was a feature of early decades. But 
American Judaism has thrown open the doors for daily use and 
for additional adjuncts. 

The communal synagog is clearly a creation of modern times, 
with roots extending back into antiquity. The synagog has 
always been institutional, using that term in the technical sense 
employed in our own days, as well as inspirational, but chiefly 
institutional. The three primary functions of the synagog have 
been to pray, to learn, and to serve. Under these three classi- 
fications the modern synagog endeavors to meet the expanding 
requirements and insistencies of the modern Jew and Jewess. 

To satisfy the craving for greater self-realization, wider cul- 
ture, more knowledge and rational recreation in the synagog 
various new devices are introduced there. Theatricals, for 
instance, have a modern vogue and several social centers 
attached to congregations have a play-shop group who produce 
the approved one-act plays of the day, or in some instances plays 
composed by members of their group. There is an educational 
value involved in the preparation of a theatrical performance 
that by right should be assumed by the synagog. The ambition 
of Judaism is to create within the soul of the Jew a conscious- 
ness of holiness. Call it consecration or piety or spirituality. 
Your label is inconsequential. Holiness is an ancient and a 
venerable term. But holiness means nothing else than wholeness, 
wholesomeness and perfectibility. It is the business of the syna- 
gog to aid in outdrawing these talents everyone inherits. The 
ritual provides the incentive. The social center provides the 
technique in part for the exercise of that talent, and society 
the field where it is put to work. Surely the synagog can not 
call upon men to do justly, to love mercy and walk the earth 
reverently without surveying the field wherein these exalted 
virtues are to function. In the social center appropriate facili- 
ties are devised to meet the situation of old and young. This 
may mean an orchestra, a gymnasium, an arts and crafts class, 
sewing, millinery; boy and girl scouts in addition to the regu- 
lation religious school curriculum, with lectures on Jewish liter- 
ature and history, as well as systematic studies in philanthropy, 
Americanization, sociology, art, and even religion.*® 

“ There was tremendous opposition to the introduction of these agencies 


into the synagog. The late E. G. Hirsch rejected an article of the writers 
favoring these activities within the range of the synagog on the score that 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 237 


Religious organizations within the synagog have followed 
the development of Reform or American Judaism.°° These 
represent a transition not a finality. In the early period, the 
rabbis were busy abstracting the universal, prophetic elements 
of Judaism from the bundle of traditional ceremonies and prac- 
tices of rabbinism. Advocates of this construction, they were 
concerned in teaching; imparting a new meaning to Jewish 
destiny, to displace the nationalistic version of rebuilding Pales- 
tine, which dominated Jewish minds for centuries.** His pro- 
fessional requirements, namely, that of teaching, technically 
and figuratively obligated the rabbi to search Scripture and 
Jewish literature for verification of his interpretation of Jewish 
destiny. His authority was obtained from the amplitude of 
opinions concurring with his version of Judaism recorded in the 
statements of Jewish writers and thinkers, whose conceptions 
of the unfolding spirit of God evolved a Jewish science. The 
modern American Rabbi justified his contention by citing the 
opinion of those rabbis whose researches have established this 
science. In order to know of these opinions and decisions, it 
was necessary for them and for nim also to read Jewish authors 
of ancient and mediaeval times, who sought the Lord wherever 
he could be found and called upon Him when He was near. 

These reform rabbis laid the foundation of American Judaism 
and this succeeding generation accepts their results. Modern 
congregations are being incorporated in all states of the Union. 
There are affiliated with the Union of American Hebrew Con- 
gregations alone, 236 congregations.5*? This leaves out of count 
the synagogs mustered with the United Synagogs of America 
and the orthodox federation. While the United Synagogs are 


he was opposed to the policy of converting the synagog into what he char- 
acterized as “a department store of religion.” Yet when the present Sinai 
Temple was erected,.a social center was annexed. The Editor of the 
Reform Advocate had changed his mind. 


5° Tdeas crystallized into institutions. New ideas ever arise outside of 
institutions and in spite of them. The new vision seen by the seers of our 
own time in quest of the larger realization of freedom politically, eco- 
nomically and socially is not sighted from the watch tower of the syna- 
gog, sad to say; or from any established institution which is after its 
nature rooted in the accepted and time-tried, but from without the fold. 

"This attitude is still entertained by the Chief Rabbi of England (for- 
tunately we need none in the United States), who in his address at the 
Conference of Jewish Preachers (July, 1923) harped again on this ancient 
note. 

* Figures of 1920. 


238 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


“semi-orthodox,” which means according to their translation, 
more ceremonial retained in synagog and home, there is a suf- 
ficient cleavage even in these from traditional orthodoxy to 
warrant the statement that as the status of United Synagogs 
are today, so were the reform congregations fifty years ago. 
To all intents and purposes the United Synagogs are reform or 
American. 


To all of these the pioneers of American Judaism bequeathed 
a precedent and process, a conception of Judaism compatible 
with American democracy and wedded to it. “I betrothed thee 
unto me in righteousness, in mercy and in peace, and thou shalt 
know the Lord,” says both American Judaism and democracy 
to every man, woman and child, regardless of race, religion and 
previous conditions of social existence. 


On this inheritance of American Judaism the present genera- 
tion of American Jews have entered. The first contribution to 
this conception was not in the realm of the spirit. It was 
a physical or material adjunct: a means had to! be provided to 
exercise those high and lofty conceptions of life. American 
Judaism encourages the individual Jews to realize the totality 
of their endowments, or in popular parlance, their souls. Under 
the influence of American Judaism, the functions of the synagogs 
were mutiplied. Instead of serving men alone it became the 
rendezvous for women, who in turn came not merely to pray 
but to work and study the better, to know their duties and how 
to fulfill them. 


In this status, the synagog as institution and symbolization 
of doctrine exists today.®* It is impossible for any organization 
to remain stationary. The American Synagog has been adjusted 
to American environment in ceremonial and doctrine. There 
has been added the means and instruments for self-determina- 
tion set up by American Judaism through the creation of 
innumerable religious adjuncts and enterprises. The program 
appears to be full. 


And yet, despite the amplitude of functions and organization, 
despite social-centers and a bedazzling array of clubs, circles, 
classes, conferences and curriculum, there is discontent. It is 
more than the large and liberal discontent that enkindles prog- 
ress. There is a downright hunger, a spiritual under-nourish- 


* The Modern synagog is a logical development and accords with Jewish 
tradition. 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 239 


ment as if one housed in opulence and dwelling in affluence 
were anaemic from malnutrition or improper feeding. The cry 
goes forth “to bring religion again into the home.” Ignoring the 
fact that this conception of religion is unJewish, it is the vestment 
of that movement now shambling across the continent in the 
monkish cow! of pietism. The movement is not unknown in Juda- 
ism. It is a survival of mediaeval pietism. It has been proposed 
to inject into American Judaism a neo-chassidism. 

This movement must be analyzed. It is reactionary in the 
extreme and calls into play the most vicious forces known to 
the Jewish religion. As the intellectuality of the early reform 
pulpit was gradually displaced by an era of religious enter- 
prises, so now these varied activities which were re-enforce- 
ments to culture, education, and self-realization, are doomed to 
be overlaid by the dust of a quietistic cult. Again from the 
orient comes this narcotic of inaction. Bahaism, a variant of 
pietism, is gaining converts among oriental Jews to an alarming 
extent as the quietism and self-centered propaganda of Christian 
Science in this country. Both are anti-Jewish. Pietism, lone 
kin of many sects, from the Essenes to the Chassidim, is gaining 
converts by scores. Whether this means that the social activi- 
ties of the synagog will cease, and in their stead sepulchral 
quietism will reign, no one can possibly foretell. It behooves 
us to examine this cult of quietism now being revived. There is 
destined to be founded here an order of neo-chassidim with 
bishop’s voices domiciled in pious parsonages attended by a 
retinue of neophytes as in the heydey of ignorance and bigotry 
these alleged “Saints” held sway in the “hinterland” of Europe. 

It is evident that those who yield to the lure of this pietistic 
siesta and are lulled by the ululations chanted by “spiritually- 
minded cantors,” overlook the dynamic quality of Judaism. The 
universe is now read in terms of motion. The cosmic urge 
includes each moral being and is manifest also in the Jewish 
group. Its religious consciousness seeks to impress upon earth 
and materials the imprint of deity. The Jew aims to interpret 
this concept in life and seeks to fashion all things according to 
the beauty of holiness. There is imposed upon him the duty 
of expressing this urge and energy. He lends to his creative 
impulses the inspirations of his poetic vision of earth redeemed 
from the lust and selfishness, from ignorance and blatant fanati- 
cism. There is ever surging within his consciousness these 
waves of creativeness, and as he seizes them, converting to the 


240 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


uses of his humanity these stimulations from on High, he 
upbuilds the world and re-enacts an ancient injunction: to till 
the earth and subdue it to the uses of mankind. 

There may be other emanations of life that Judaism is not 
capable of sensing. It may be disqualified from absorbing the 
quietism of the Buddhist®* who, victimized by the climatic and 
physical conditions of his tropical habitat, weaves a delicate 
fabric of other worldliness, after the pattern of theosophy, to 
assuage his soul. The Jews have been realists to this extent: 
They have dwelt on earth, their feet planted on substantial 
domains, while their outlook has been outward and upward 
and onward. Their test has been: by their fruits shall we know 
them. That measure wherewith they have been measured they 
apply to other groups, and when the followers of Buddhism 
are requisitioned to make testimony by actual achievements of 
their benefits and boons, humanity has little to accredit them 
aside from their literature. This is not stated in arrogance, but as 
a verification and vindication of the faith that is in Israel. The 
Jews have mightily influenced the world. They have put a God. 
of righteousness, justice and truth, in the soul of man, and that 
God asks man to love one another so that all may dwell here 
on earth in peace. 

The pendulum of progress in Judaism swings as it does else- 
where from inspiration to institution. In the beginning there 
is the word which incarnates the thought of him who sees 
visions. The seers expound and are usually martyred or in our 
vernacular “fired.” Finally their word is accepted. Their 
thought is materialized into a thing, usually a building. 

Reform Judaism was in the early days a propaganda. It 
became in this country, where it enjoyed more freedom and 
expansion than in the cradle-land of its original advocacy, a 
tangible reality. American Judaism, as reform is now being 
designated, has now become institutionalized. This has been 
shown in part. Movements as vital as religious promptings can 
not remain stationary unless they solidify into the static and 
Jews are too oxygenic for that process to ensue for any length 
of time. Conscious of this institutionalization, there is a crav- 
ing for something else which on the one hand partakes of piet- 
ism, and on the other of discontent with the insufficiency of a 


“Tagore, India’s poet laureate, is being translated into Hebrew by 
Dia laq wala: 


ORGANIZATION OF RELIGIOUS ENTERPRISES 241 


religion merely concerned with a ceremonial and unrelated to 
actualities. The Jewish teachers are disconcerted. It is evident 
that their usefulness is restricted when they are denied access 
to the sources of man’s controlling concerns, that is his economic 
status. Religion in life means more ethics in industry and busi- 
ness. The old standards of individualism are being abandoned 
because their values are exhausted.®®> Service, not self, and he 
profits most who serves best, represent a mental attitude of 
the age which regards well-being for all more important than 
the welfare of a privileged group. Democracy no longer means 
political freedom alone, but economic and industrial freedom 
also. To hasten this day which is the messianic era for those 
who attain it, the future beckons the Jews of today. 


55 Decay of Capitalistic Civilization, by Beatrice and Sidney Webb 


REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS IN 
AMERICAN JUDAISM 


There is at the root of religion, as Haverlock Ellis shows in 
his ‘Dance of Life,” a mystic element due to the “relationship 
of the Self to the Not-Self, of the individual to a whole, when, 
going beyond his own personal ends, he (i. e. man) discovers 
his own adjustment to larger ends in harmony or devotion or 
love.” (p. 191). The covenantal relationship between God and 
man is the specific term of religion in Judaism. A covenant 
was effected by God with Israel. This covenant or b’rith par- 
took in antiquity of the nature of a sacrifice in which, according 
to primitive customs, members of the tribe become related 
(literally, blood-brothers), as a result of drinking the blood of 
the animal sacrificed or being sprinkled therewith. By analogy 
the god becomes a brother, a member and part of that particular 
tribe. But in very early times, at the dawn of recorded speech, 
the Covenant made by God with Noah, for instance, is designed 
to impress upon him and all future generations the perpetuity 
and continuity of the natural order of the world which is never 
again to be altered or interrupted by cataclysm like floods; at 
least this is the interpretation of the rabbis. In this covenant 
there is exacted of man the observance of certain laws such as 
not to shed blood nor eat the blood of animals. This covenant, 
be it noted, is not made with Noah alone but includes all man- 
kind. From the very beginning of history, what became the 
Jewish religion is conceived and born in a covenantal relationship 
which is the universal basis of all religions. 

This concept of a covenant naturally undergoes enlargement 
in scope and compass. Imposing obligations on Israel, it aims 
to reclaim all members of the human family for the vaster 
covenant which will eventually be attained. That this may be 
brought to pass, God chose Abraham, as one who was faithful 
to the obligations of His covenant, which are moral laws. God 
made a special covenant with him for all his descendants who 
might be as numerous as the stars above and as the sands by the 
seashore. Yet in every compact of the covenant, the obligation 
depends on the obedience to the conditions of morality enforced. 
The covenant is set up that justice may be done and righteous- 


242 


REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS 243 


ness fostered. At first this is limited within the narrow confines 
of the nation. Later this is to encompass the ever widening 
circles of humanity. This covenant with Abraham was the 
harbinger of other covenants, particularly that concluded with 
Israel through Moses on Sinai,? whereby the Jewish people 
were consecrated to be the eternal guardians of the divine cove- 
nant with mankind until that time when a religion of morality 
shall encompass all nations of the earth, and be the profession 
and confession of all men. 

“In this covenant of Sinai,” says Kohler,? “the free moral 
relationship of man to God is brought out; this forms the char- 
acteristic feature of a revealed religion in contradistinction to 
natural religion. In paganism, the Deity formed an inseparable 
part of the nation itself; but through the covenant, God becomes 
a free moral power, appealing for allegiance to the spiritual 
nature of man. This idea of the covenant suggested to the 
prophet Hosea the analogy with the conjugal relation of love 
and loyalty which became typical of the tender relation of God 
to Israel through the centuries. In days of direct woe—God’s 
covenant is everlasting and is ever renewed in the hearts of the 
people, but never replaced by a new covenant. Upon this eternal 
renewal of the covenant with God rests the unique history of 
Judaism, its wondrous preservation and regeneration throughout 
the’ ares = *)*" 

And yet this covenant, vital as it is, is merely an exalted 
fiction set up by the Jew to enable him to adjust himself to 
this world. If man lives by his imagination surely the genera- 
tions of those descending from Abraham have ordered their lives 
according to this vision of a binding relationship between their 
God and themselves, which exact obedience in terms of holy 
living and hallowed lives, and using this bond of relationship 
that through them blessings may ensue from this divine con- 
summation for all men. 

If mysticism is then engendered by contemplation of this 
covenant and a desire to harmonize one’s will with the essence of 
this universe, there is the fundamental natural instinct in man to 
explain it and the blessings ensuing from the establishment of 
the covenant to justify it. It is not meet for this discussion to 
examine the arguments leading up to the acceptance of the 

* Hosea, 2:18-22: Jeremiah, 31:34. 


*Exodus,. 19:3-25. 
* Jewish Theology, p. 49. 


244 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


covenantal relationship from science, folk-lore, comparative 
religions or comparative psychology. It is evident that reli- 
gion, among whomsoever it has become manifest,—and it is 
universal—has devised a certain covenant after the order of 
this relationship obtaining between God and Israel. In primitive 
days, the covenant was crude, its spiritualizing during the ages 
came to pass gradually: with Israel the covenant is now firmly 
established as an authority and sanction for fulfilling the laws 
of God, who is spiritually a part, the rabbis. say, a “partner” 
with man in the work of creation. That which is associated 
with God (justice, love, mercy, righteousness, truth, benevolence, 
work and service), all that which prevails in God in fullness is 
according to Judaism, also in man, and constitutes the world 
order of morality. Reduced to ethical laws that are to be pat- 
terns of conduct and behavior, God’s covenant with Israel exacts 
the fulfillment of these moral obligations to the end that all 
humanity may be blessed by them. 


Contemplating this covenant may kindle emotion in the tem- 
peramental. If one is so endowed, he may enter the arena of 
conscience and there unroll before his unveiled eyes a vision 
of universality. People with an over-developed religious sense, 
combined with an under-developed science sense, are prone to 
indulge in a carousal of the soul. There have been lapses of 
this sort at various periods in Jewish history. Obedience to the 
law has yielded to a contemplation of its operations as a divine 
spectacle. There has been, as an aftermath, a well-defined strain 
of mysticism in Jewish circles for centuries.* It is therefore not 
singular that today mysticism is again intruding through the 
curtains that shield the arc of the covenant. 

Judaism can not be, nor should be, charged with sordidness. 
It has with sensible regard for the true and worthy things and 
values of life admitted the possibilities of mysticism, but never 
gave it sufficient encouragement to perpetrate it as a rite or 
need of body or soul. Possibly Judaism has been too pragmatic 
to give more heed to the streams of inspiration and motivation 
that affect. conduct. When there was so much misery in the 
world (and the. Jew the most glaring illustration thereof), there 
was sorry benefit garnered by contemplating the mystic tie that 
binds man to God. Rather the actual deed of feeding the hungry, 


“Akiba Eger (1761-1837), a Talmudist of great renown, living in Posen, 
was a persistent and doughty opponent of the mystics in his day. 


REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS 245 


clothing the naked and setting free the captive was urged as 
vastly more essential than hearkening to dulcet music wafted by 
spiritual spheres. 

The primary condition of concluding the covenant lodged in 
the discharge of social duties rather than assuming a posture 
of inactivity held in catalyptic rigidity by a surcharge of ecstacy. 
Emotions of this sort, in fact all phases of elation were in the 
consciousness of the Jew (who may have until recent years 
pried open volumes on psychoanalysis) repugnant, even for- 
bidden® since their exercise entails a certain peril of sensualism. 
This applies likewise to mysticism. The natural wholesome 
sense of the Jew repudiates it as a transgression of the ethical 
laws, providing nothing to the man or woman which would 
enable him or her to serve his humanity more efficiently, faith- 
fully or diligently. It is a superfluous and extravagant luxury 
of the emotions which it is admitted obtain in the soul of man 
but functioned as a rite or a ceremony of religion must be dis- 
counted, discouraged and denounced. 

The cult of mysticism is withal one of the fads of the day. 
Among the reactionary tendencies which are characteristic of 
our period, mysticism is being feted and fostered as a panacea 
of social ills and a salve for unselfishness. It is promoted as a 
refuge of escape from the entangling alliance of bridge whist, 
mah jong, poker games, golf, social functions, and all the other 
beguilements invented by the leisure classes to banish their 
boredom and provide substitutes for work. No man who has 
to get up at five o’clock every day is troubled with insomnia, 
said an American sage, and no woman who has to earn her 
daily bread bothers with mysticism. Still it is one of our 
modern reactionary manifestations and must be combatted. 

The Jewish mystics have a long ancestry despite the prevail- 
ing opinion that the religion of the Jews and mysticism stand at 
opposite poles of thought. And yet, J. Abelson, author of “Jew- 
ish Mysticism,” is authority for saying that Jewish mysticism 
is as old as the Old Testament. The current flowed on, he 


5° The ascetic spirit which encourages self-mortification and rigid renun- 
ciation of all pleasure is declared sinful in rabbinical literature, and has 
set a precedent for subsequent ages. In their way the rabbis predicted 
that in the world to come man shall have to give an account for every 
enjoyment presented him in his earthly life if used with appreciation of 
the cheer and good fellowship proffered or rejected with ingratitude. 
Abstinence is considered praiseworthy only in so far as it disciplines the 
wild desires and passions. 


246 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


alleges, uninterrupted into the rabbinical era. It is of course a 
matter of academic concern whether or not this is the case. 
There are those who like H. Graetz (1817-1891) the Jewish 
historian, ascribes the origin of Jewish mysticism to a French 
Rabbi, Isaac ben Abraham of Posquieres. He is regarded as 
the father of the Kabbalah which is the word in Jewish literature 
for all phases of mysticism. There are many evidences to show 
that mysticism did not appear suddenly from without like an 
imported exotic plant blooming spontaneously on arid plains, 
but in naive, unconscious form, some aspect of mystic transport 
traces back to the sudden inrush of inspiration that seized the 
prophets. No one doubts that their kinship with God endowed 
them with a higher and finer insight into His will than is the 
potentiality of ordinary man. 

The earliest beginnings of mysticism consciously exercised 
is usually accredited to the Essenes whose mode of life differed 
from the general body of contemporary Jews. Records available 
show that these esthetics strove to live a life of purity and 
holiness away from Palestinian centers of population. They 
were primitive communists living in isolated groups, in monkish 
celibacy, enjoying unusual ecstacies and experiencing visions 
denied ordinary mortals. Seeing visions and hearing heaven— 
transporting sounds typical of the mystics of all ages. 

There are throughout the Talmudic literature references to 
sects such as the Zenuim, “the chaste ones,” who bear the hall- 
mark of all ancient and mediaeval Jewish mysticism. Thus 
indicating that the Kabbalah had predecessors in these mystic 
sects and those who used lore of the heavenly throne chariot of 
Ezekiel. Philo’s metraton, logos, the Sefer Yezirah (Book of 
Creation) with its doctrines of emanations and the ten Sefirot 
or agencies through which God created the world, viz: wisdom, 
cognition, strength, power, inexorableness, justice, right, love, 
prayer, were prominent predecessors of the Kabbalah. 

The Book of Creation,? Yezirah, lands us into the heart of 
Jewish mysticism and prepares the way for the ramified litera- 
ture of the Zohar, literally “brightness,” which is the text-book 
of Jewish mediaeval mysticism from its first appearance in Spain 
in the 13th Century to the present. What the Zohar aims to 
teach, says Abelson, “is that man having the privilege to behold 


_ “Life and works of Saadia Gaon, by H. Malter, contains a lengthy analy- 
sis of the Sefer Yezirah, pp. 179-99. 


REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS 247 


everywhere the Divine image, can, if he will, make his way to 
the Invisible Author of all and be united with the Unseen. 
The Universe is Divine Spirit materialized, and it is given to 
man to have contact with it, since it and the world wherein he 
abides is an embodiment of God which his soul, in contemplat- 
ing the wonders of the universe, may perceive and recognize.” 
As in all systems of mysticism, the soul plays a towering part. 
It is the center of gravity in mysticism,—Jewish and non-Jew- 
ish. The close kinship between the human and divine is linked 
more securely thereby. The one avenue through which this 
kinship can become real is the soul. The soul is a spiritual 
entity for the mystic, and seeks to enter consciously into the 
presence of God. It can do so only under the spur of an over- 
powering ecstatic emotion called love, which is the soul’s most 
visible tangible quality. When the soul has completed the cycle 
of its earthly career, it hurries back to the source of life and 
becomes blended with the Oversoul, where it is united by this 
kiss of death with the Divine presence, and this abides forever 
in an immortal union, 

This view of the soul, it is readily understood, is an incentive 
to nobler living not only for each individual Jew, but for the 
group which, according to the traditional aspirations of the 
Jews, on the warrant offered by Scripture, will attain its fulfill- 
ment and highest evolution in the arrival of the Messiah. The 
famous Kabbalist and mystic, Isaac Luria (1535-1572) main- 
tained that man, by means of his soul, unites the upper and the 
lower world. He maintains further that with the creation of 
Adam there were created at the same time all the souls of all 
races of mankind. This fantastic notion savors much of Plato- 
nism. In fact, it is an excrescence of neoplatonism which per- 
meated the mediaeval world and lent to many a mystic the 
insubstantial pageant of his vision. Hence Luria made liberal 
drafts on Platonism for the beliefs imparted his disciples who 
gathered around him in Safed, Palestine. He taught that there 
were “variations in the physical qualities of men, so there are 
corresponding variations in their souls.” There are souls of 
all shades and degrees of values which fluctuate between good 
and extremely bad souls. When Adam sinned there was con- 
fusion in all these classes of souls which might appear to some 
an approach to the Christian doctrine of original sin. Through 
Adam the good souls became tainted with some of the evil 
inherent in bad souls; and on the contrary, the bad souls receive 


248 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


many ingredients of goodness from the souls of the good. By 
this subtle admixture, there will be in the later days (which 
means the coming of the Messiah) a perfect condition. Until 
that time all souls, tainted as they all inevitably are with sin, 
must by means of the process of transmigration from one body 
to another, shake off more and more of the dross clinging to 
them. When they reach that summit of purity and perfection 
they will unite with the infinite source. 

From this doctrine’ Luria taught his disciples, and through 
them each individual Jew, that in promoting the growth of his 
own soul each one is really prompting the welfare of his group 
collectively. Upon the weal or woe of his own soul hangs the 
weal or woe of the Jewish people. His conclusion is far more 
valuable than his argumentation, as it happens often with all 
of us. 

Jewish mysticism, subsequent to the Zohar, continues the 
doctrines developed in that absorbing farrago of fantasies and 
elaborates them. Abelson says there is “an enormous fund of 
originality in many of these elaborations.” These men,’ satu- 
rated with mystic sentiment and living on high spiritual plane, 
gave forth the earnest cry of their souls, and so without con- 
scious design composed prayer and liturgical hymns that 
constitute a material addition to the enormous store of Jewish 
literature and is perhaps the direct incident to that great relig- 
ious movement known as Chassidism, which arose among the 
Polish Jewish at the beginning of the eighteenth century. 


At the core of this movement was the yearning to revive the 
spiritual element in Judaism which had become seared by the 
dry air of rabbinical casuistry and formalism. The impulse that 
stirred the hearts of those who injected Chassidism into the 
Jewish world aimed to show that Judaism meant more than the 
fulfillment and discharge of commandments enjoined in the 
ritual. These gracious warm-hearted rabbis intended to release 
the emotions of love, aspiration and faith felt by each living 
Jewish man and woman for God who, as their Father, was ever 
near, and whose heart overflowed with compassion. The Chassi- 
dim strove to effect the supremacy of a religion of the heart, 
an inward revelation over the dogmatism of tradition. There is 
little doubt but that the corrective was needed to withstand and 


7 Abelson’s account thereof has been followed. 
* Post-Biblical Hebrew Literature, by B. Halper, p. 243, sqq. 


REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS 249 


overpower the force of intellectuality initiated by the philoso- 
phers of the Spanish-Arabic period. While its devotees in course 
of time cultivated excesses, it was a force in Judaism, making 
conscious in each one the endowment of an inner impulse that 
urges each one to seek and find that trail amid the intricacies 
of the soul, leading to the Shekinah. 

If there is today an attempt to inoculate the present genera- 
tion with the toxin of pietism as a cure against sordid materiality 
and the reign of Jewish millionaires as leaders of Jews, their 
direct forebears are the Chassidim of Galicia. 


For the revival of interest in the Chassidim and whatever 
knowledge of them there has been given us in recent days, we 
can thank Professor S. Schechter, late president of the Jewish 
Theological Seminary, who popularized this sect in English 
speaking countries.® 

The Chassidim described by him appear now as models for 
those American Jews who are making rapid advances along the 
road towards “spiritualizing Judaism,” which is the outstanding 
ambition of the mystics so far as they have any material desires. 
There is an inclination to court pietism in one of the sundry 
guises, among which is an abundant and promiscuous praying in 
seclusion.*° Jewish traditions always looked with suspicion on 
such tendencies for excessive praying, and established an accept- 
able time for prayer, an hour when all members of the congrega- 
tion were able to take up public worship which is far more 
helpful than the devotional aberrations and emotional elations. 


*Studies in Judaism (First Series), by S. Schechter, essay on “The 
Chassidim.” 


Tt is very singular that American Jews of Reform antecedents are 
prone to overdevelop, certainly overindulge praying. Whether imtiating 
non-Jewish precedent, prayer is now a proper form for formal opening of 
public as well as private exercises. Events as far apart as charity bazaars, 
relief drives, literary and political conferences, wherever, in a word, two 
or more gather together in the aid of a common design, prayer begins and 
a benediction often ends the session. Jewish tradition set time and fitting 
benedictions, a ritual. This practice is now being discarded. With the 
advent. of women’s equality in politics there was accorded her certain 
leadership in religion, also, which is now being exercised in clamoring for 
prayer-books, manuals of private devotion, more spirituality in the synagog 
and religion in the home. “The Book of Prayer and Meditation” issued 
by the Central Conference of Rabbis, the “Book of Prayers” published by 
the Council of Jewish Women, are indicative of this tendency. The con- 
sciousness of dependency so pronounced in women accounts possibly for 
this proclivity. Judaism abstractly envisaged often tends toward femin- 
ism, which is another story. 


250 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


The Chassidim and their American imitators are of particular 
interest because they are motivated by impulses which are con- 
trary to the sound sense of Judaism in its insistence on com- 
munal endeavor as an index of piety. Yet the religious attitudes 
of these two sects or factions are so nearly identical one is 
warranted in presuming that modern pietism and its propensity 
for prayer on all and sundry occasions is a modern outbreak 
of religious frenzy such as characterized the older Chassidim. 
By virtue of the inclination of modern pietists to segregate the 
religious function to an emotional experience, these modern 
mimics of mysticism inherit the psychosis of religious ecstacy 
given their mediaeval predecessors. 

Chassidism, Professor Schechter tells us, was in its inception 
a revolt among the Jews of Eastern Europe against the excessive 
casuistry of the contemporary Rabbis and the present revolt 
against Reform Judaism is, as has been shown, a like reaction 
against intellectualism. The center of this sect was in Podolia 
and Volhynasia and began to be a distinct and conscious move- 
ment towards the latter part of the seventeeuth century. 

Of the three channels in which Jewish thought functions, 
namely, reason, tradition and the written record, the Chassidim 
chose neither but aimed directly at the emotions, as the modern 
mystics in the metropolis. It was, as Schechter says, “One more 
manifestation of the yearning of the human hearts towards the 
divine idea and the ceaseless craving of the heart for direct 
communion with God. It was the protest of an emotional but 
uneducated people against a one-sided expression of Judaism, 
presented to them in cold and over-subtle disquisitions which not 
only did they not understand, but which shut out the play of 
the feelings and affections so that religion was made almost 
impossible to them.”!1 

Movements regnant in American Judaism today are likewise 
protests against intellectualism in the synagog wherein Judaism 
has been subtly abstracted and rendered imperviuus to emotion- 
alism or the yearning of the human heart in this covenantal 
relationship of the self with the not-self or God. The preach- 
ment of the synagog had acclimatized the methods of European 
universities and combined in happy proportions hortatory 
appeals to character and such needful information that the 
hearer would be induced to reflect on what was told him and 


4 “The Chassidim,” Opus Cit., p. 20, sqq. 


REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS 251 


adjust his conduct to ampler and fuller social ways. But this 
calm rationality did not satisfy the craving of the heart for emo- 
tional expressions which was apparently most urgently sought 
by those who yearned to “bring religion into the home,” to 
“spiritualize Judaism,” and enable the “soul to cleave unto 
God.” In brief Judaism in America had not devised an emotional 
outlet of sufficient amplitude for the outpouring of elation 
engendered in the fulfilling of certain ceremonials of antiquity.” 
Elation had been in a slight degree experienced in the revival 
of traditional hymns or chants. But no thoroughgoing revival 
of all the rabbinical provisions had been instituted. Hence the 
need of the neo-chassidim to save American Jews from impiety 
by reviving ceremonies capable of elation such as kindling the 
Sabbath lights and literally “rejoicing” in the law. 

Judaism, it is true, had been preoccupied in adjusting inherited 
ceremonies and content to an American environment. These 
modifications were made according to the methods of adjust- 
ment operative in a wholesome growth of the religious revela- 
tion, namely reason, tradition and literature. Whatever doctrine 
and duty satisfied the canons of reason and the precedents of 
tradition as revealed in Jewish literature was appropriated to 
defend and explain Judaism in America. Less reliance was 
imposed on emotion than reason, albeit emotions are powerful, 
possibly more powerful than reason. Even so, reason is safe. 
Emotions are often wild impulses. An ethical religion, such 
as Judaism, demands ethical action as the fulfillment of its 
destiny, and all ethical acts are manifestations of inhibited 
impulses. Emotion is not always inhibited. Emotion is more 
often unrestrained and unethical. If American Judaism has not 
yielded willingly to the importunities of emotionalism, it is due 

“The museums for religious ceremonial objects which are now being 
installed in synagogs as well as in the Hebrew Union College serves a two- 
fold purpose: instruction in religious archaeology, showing the utensils 
used in conjunction with worship. The other object is emotional. Asso- 
ciated with all ceremonial objects are tender memories. These associated 
memories link each one to his kin and group and bind up these discarded 
objects in the swaddling bands of recollection. There is just this possi- 
bility that the objects now so zealously restored to library shelves and 
museum cabinets are incitements to emotion and guarded for these tender 
quiverings of the heart than their archaeological value. What to rational 
minded modern the fact that the philacteries are survivals of talismen? 
What pathos and infinite tenderness surrounds the philacteries wherewith 
“father used to pray.” The rationalism of the reform movement damp- 


ened the ardor of emotionalism and emotion is near the surface of every 
Jew—scratch a Jew and one exposes his emotionalism. 


252 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


to the sound judgment of American Jews who instinctively 
revolted against perversions in their religion—a religion at 
once practical and idealistic, mystical and pragmatic. The real 
is ever the gateway to the ideal, which stretches out towards 
the future and penetrates the unknown. 


There was, however, a sensation, or might one not say a con- 
sciousness, or fulfillment even in this simple rationalism, Within 
the synagog there is apparently in recent days as keen a craving 
for the stimulation of emotions as there was for the children 
of the Desert to worship the Golden Calf. This craving had 
to be satisfied because the propaganda of American Judaism 
did not provide it as copiously as certain ceremonials of rabbin- 
ism had. Take for instance the blessing over the Sabbath lights. 
This ceremony rendered poetic by tender memories is being 
revived, on the part of the mothers of Israel. This rite, when 
analyzed psychically, does not uphold the arguments advanced 
in its favor by those who are endeavoring to “introduce religion 
into the home” and claim that this rite is needed to instill 
religion in the household. On the contrary, the feeling of elation 
aroused by kindling the lights in this ceremony borders more 
closely on the sexual than the advocates of “more religion in 
the home” realize. The feeling of elation that is stimulated is 
mistaken for piety. Reform Judaism has not curried favors 
with emotionalism because it leads to unwholesome consequences 
and excitements and in discouraging the ceremonials that stimu- 
lated them emphasis was laid on more social action. 

The high task set by American Judaism required service here 
and now for humanity, which is a poetic manner of saying what 
is implied in collective action and social service. In this relig- 
ion, work, laughter, love, good-health, co-operation, mutuality, 
education, and loyalty to God and country*® are the essential 
doctrines in their practical aspects. But certain individual Jews, 
and particularly Jewesses craved a personal stimulus, and inti- 
mate consciousness of the stir and surge of an attitude which 
admits “communion with God.” In this decade, the demands 
of Jewish women are granted for prudential reasons, since men. 
who formerly administered and excluded women now retire and 
give them control. Their feministic construction of the religious 
function in terms of emotion, often challenges Jewish tradition 
and ursurps the control formerly exercised by men. Jewish 


1% “What Men Live By,” by Dr. Cabot. 


REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS 253 


women are more “interested in religion” today than men, it is 
said, and having equality in the affairs of the synagog can now 
vote their opinions and desires whether good or vicious. Whether 
to be en rapport with God, attuned to the cosmos or subdued in 
an all enfolding nirvanna is synonymous with this yearning for 
God, there is no denying that the neo-Chassidim are “selling” 
“communion with God” more frequently than they are imitating 
God. 

This doctrine of communion with God and allied notions such 
as “cleaving to God” are symptoms of pathology, viewed from 
the diagnosis of religion as sane and healthy as Reform Juda- 
ism. They are aberrations of what might engage the atten- 
tion of the psychoanalyst. Pathological cases represent noth- 
ing but an extension of perfectly normal tendencies. Traits that 
lie slumbering in men and women everywhere are exposed by 
pathology. These emotional traits are now being outdrawn by 
the neo-chassidim and are survivals of previous states?* within 
the psychic organism of Israel. Attributing to a historical peo- 
ple organic unity such as Israel exhibits, it is perfectly plausible 
to draw comparisons from biology and psychology. In the bio- 
logical organism there are malformations and monstrosities 
which are “sports” to use the biological term, or off-shoots from 
the natural parent stem, assymmetrical instead of symmetrical, 
embodying contents previously entertained. As if from the 
depths of the sea terrestrial eruptions cast on the surface re- 


volting and loathsome creatures that infest the hidden taverns 
of the deep.?® 


One needs be reminded of brain storms or mental explosions 
with fatal reactions to catch the analogy in these two fields. The 
accidents that happen in nature can likewise occur in the brain. 
There is today an unconscious indeterminate effort to revive 
an exploited and disreputable symptom of Judaism as there is 
a scheme to commercialize superstition by attaching magical 
attributes to the “mazzuzah”** which in its original state was 
a talisman or charm. Popularizing the theories and attitudes 
of the Chassidim is a reactionary movement in American Juda- 
ism. America is too practical to deal with it and counteract 
the deadening narcotics it prescribes. The keynote of the Chas- 


14 Folk-Lore and Old Testament, J. G. Frazer, pp. 1-3. 


*“The Pathology of Religious Worship” has been treated with great 
thoroughness by Prof. William James. 


* A cylinder-shaped receptacle containing extracts of Deut. 6:4-10. 


254 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


sidim of old is the Immanence of God, the universality of Divin- 
ity. The idea of the constant living presence of God in all 
existence permeates the whole of this scheme. From it is 
deduced every important proposition and every rule of conduct. 
All created things and every product of human intelligence owe 
their being to God. To this their modern descendants also agree. 

The Chassidim believe that “All generation and all existence 
spring from the thought and will of God,” says Schechter. It 
is incumbent upon man to believe that all things are pervaded 
by the divine life and remember that it is the divine life which is 
speaking through him when he speaks. There is nothing which 
is void of God who is the source of corporeal beauty. 

One thing the Chassidim did; they never allowed their 
thoughts to abide with the body when they could rise to the 
inward contemplation of the infinite soul of beauty, which is 
God. This aspect of the older doctrine modern Chassidim are 
also introducing. Even the very name of God is always speak- 
ing, acting and generating throughout heaven and earth in end- 
less gradations and varieties. I{ the vitalizing word were to 
cease, chaos would reign. Creation is a continuous and an un- 
ending manifestation of the Goodness of God. All things are 
an affluence from the two divine attributes of Power and Love 
which are manifested in various images and reflections. 

God, father of Israel, All powerful, merciful and loving, cre- 
ated everything and is embodied in everything. But as creation 
is continuous, so also is revelation. This revelation is only to 
be grasped by faith. Faith is therefore more efficacious than 
learning since it is faith in the revelation of God that makes us 
aware of the manifestations of the Divinity in all things. Faith 
is a doctrine the modern Jewish pulpits, even those not favorable 
to revamped pietism begin to harp on. It is a new note some- 
what discordant in Jewish tradition. There is good in all things, 
actual and potential, say the Chassidim. While knowledge might 
incline us to discriminate, the Chassidim everywhere seek out 
and honor the good, and do not arrogate unto themselves the 
right to judge that which may seem to be evil. Modern pietists 
have not yet developed that state of guilelessness themselves, 
since whoever disagrees with them are regarded as a “menace.” 

In thinking of their fellow-men the older Chassidim endeavor 
to realize in each the presence of the spirit of good. This atti- 
tude was exalted into a doctrine enjoining each Chassid to think 
well of another and always slow to think evil of another and 


Ngee P+ 


a bre, poe 


REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS 255 


at the same time to think humbly of one’s self. This condition 
of self-effacement, by the way, has not yet been attained by the 
pietist today. The Chassidim combatted the assumption of sin- 
fulness in man and set a high value of the capacity of repent- 
ance. The notion that any one was wholly irredeemable was not 
fostered. In all men was potentiality of good and all dwellers 
in this glorious world were to praise God in gladness. For every 
man was a reflection of God. When this reflection was obscured 
by sin it was the duty of every true believer to restore the like- 
ness of God in man. 

The Chassidim, old and new, make large and liberal use of 
prayer.’ In prayer man must lay aside his own individuality 
and not even be conscious of his own existence. Hence no wish 
or need should intrude. For if, when he prays, the individual 
self is not absolutely quiescent, the object of prayer is unattain- 
able, and prayer was to admit one into the presence of the divine 
majesty, which is the modern notion of “communion with God.” 
The older Chassidim prayed to enjoy the thrill of elation in their 
communion with God. They also prayed for their fellow-men 
whom they were to honor for the good that was in them, and 
to abstain from misjudging on account of whatever evil may be 
in them. Furthermore, to work for the spiritual and moral 
reclamation of each was a part of the Chassidic doctrine, just 
as they insisted that every utterance of man, if properly under- 
stood, contains a message of God. Those who are absorbed in 
God will easily find divine elements in everything they hear, 
even though the speaker himself be quite ignorant of it. This 
is a phase of mysticism inherent in such a conception of intel- 
ligence, and shows that in Jewish as well as all other sorts of 
mysticism the natural process of cognition is abrogated and 
annulled. 


The study of the Torah was not made important among the 
Chassidim. The Torah was a revelation of God. But as the 
world itself is equally divine revelation, the Torah becomes 


““A certain man went down (to the Ark) in the presence of R. Han- 
nina. He said, O, God, the great, the mighty, the revered, the glorious, 
the powerful, the feared, the strong, the courageous, the certain, the hon- 
ored.” R. Hannina waited until he had finished. He said to him: ‘Hast 
thou exhausted all the praises of thy Lord? What is the use of all those 
(adjectives)? The three which we do say, the great, mighty and revered 
(at the beginning of the Tefillah) if Moses our teacher had not used them 
in the Torah and the men of the Great Assembly had not substituted them 
we should not have been able to say (all these adjectives).” Beraket, 33b. 


256 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


little more than a part of a larger whole. The study of the law 
is no end in itself but to enable the pious to absorb the revela- 
tion of God. The object of the whole Torah, said one of the 
Chassidim, is that “man should become a Torah himself and 
expel the Balaam within him, and develop the Abraham in him.” 
Every action of man should be a pure manifestation of God, 
as Schechter, who is authority for this, explains. 

The three virtues rated highest by the Chassidim were humil- 
ity, cheerfulness and enthusiasm.‘* Humility included the ideas 
of modesty, considerateness and sympathy that put them beyond 
the faults of vanity, conceit and self-satisfaction. One was to 
think humbly of one’s self but highly of one’s neighbor. Out 
of this virtue was born the love of man for his fellow-man, 
which was a very conspicuous trait in the chassidic practice. 
To love God enjoined the love of man, regardless of his rank and 
station, and included the common ordinary clod-hopper as well 
as the astonishingly learned pedant. 

The virtue of cheerfulness’® was ardently observed by these 
Chassidim. Cheerfulness of heart is a necessary attitude for 
service to God. In signalizing cheerful as a distinct trait, the 
Chassidim anticipated several modern cults whose fundamental 
dogma is happiness. But these pietists of the Middle Ages 
argued that one who really is a servant or child cannot fall into 
a gloomy state of mind. Serenity of soul was the bliss sought 
undisturbed by consciousness of sin. With John Burroughs 
they might have sung: 


“Serene I fold my hands and wait, 
Nor care for wind, or tide, or sea; 

I rave no more ’gainst time or fate, 
For lo! my own shall come to me.” 


Yet there was a difference due to the possibility of the sinner 
to return to God, who would have mercy upon him and abund- 
antly pardon. “Every penitent thought is a voice of God,” we 
are told by Schechter. Man should detect that voice in all the 


The lamentable feature of modern mysticism among the Jews is the 
cultivation of the excitements, elations and thrills for the sake of the 
ecstacy perverting religion to the status of a narcotic and hence indulging 
in what is essentially selfishness. The older mystics were at least com- 
pelled to exercise humility, tenderness and forbearance towards their 
group. There is no impulsion of this sort among the modern pietists. 

7” Modern Jewish pietists frown against cheerfulness, particularly in 
worship. A subdued voice, a downcast face, a sickly pallor in their cere- 
monial “make-up” when “cleaving to God.” Hence they are always serious 
and seldom cheerful or natural. 





REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS 257 


evidences of his senses, in every sight and sound of external 
nature. It is through his want of faith in the universality of 
God’s presence that man is deaf to those subtle influences per- 
meating nature. This of course is mysticism, which imposes a 
superior process of consciousness on man. Usually men become 
conscious of these influences only by reading of them in printed 
books, not by intuition. 

In this phase of their belief, there is a close approach to that 
mystic communion which is praised as the jewel of rarest charm 
today among the neo-chassidim. Among the pietists of Eastern 
Europe taking a cheerful view of things was commendable. And 
one should remember that cheerfulness was not their equivalent 
for asceticism. Asceticism is very much in vogue among neo- 
chassidim as one of the variants of their theory of “spirituality” 
(which is the neo-chassidic dogma for those ascetic doctrines 
and practices gradually invading the home and synagogs of 
America) was not fostered by them. Spirituality, the term often 
used these days, differs from the cheerful confident disposition 
that the older Chassidim sought. Spirituality if anything is more 
gloomy and despondent, particularly about “sin.” The concern 
and pre-occupation of the synagog on sin is borrowed in part 
from non-Jewish theology. But there is no doubt that sin plays 
an important item in the religious consciousness of the neo- 
chassidim. In their prayers publicly uttered invocations are 
made “to free us from sin.” Anxious scrupulosity is manifested 
to escape sin. The older Chassidim would have dismissed this 
solicitation by observing that this concern in one’s own flesh 
is a device of Satan to keep one away from true service of God. 
For God can only be served when the heart is glad. A “sinful” 
heart is sad according to their catechism. 

‘There is another phase of chassidic teaching that the neo-chas- 
sidim have not revived. It is best rendered by the word “enthu- 
siasm.” Prof. Schechter says: “Every religious act, to be of 
any avail, must be done with enthusiasm.” Perfunctory wor- 
ship is valueless. Fulfillment of every ordinance in the code, 
if performed from a sense of duty, is wasted energy. Whatever 
is done should be done with enthusiasm and love of service. 
The inspiration of true service is its own reward. At no time 
let a man believe he has attained the stature of the righteous. 
On the contrary, it is better to be in the attitude of the penitent 
who daily progresses in the knowledge and love of the Divine. 
Master, It is only the uninterrupted communion with God 


258 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


which will raise and enable your thoughts and cause the roots 
of sin that threaten to sprout in every one, to perish. Such 
absorption will result in fulfilling the whole of the Torah without 
any external command and it will become natural and self-evi- 
dent to them, a manifestation of God and life, made real through 
the fulfilling of all the Torah. 

For the end of this chassidic doctrine, the ultimate object of 
their orisons, was union with God, a consummation the neo- 
chassidim also exploit. Each one has to discover the presence of 
God in the divine word of His Torah. This mystical service of 
God eludes the grasp of ordinary mortals, and therefore becomes 
the distinguishing feature of an intermediary, an especially pious 
man who is not as much the product of learning as he is of 
intuition. Such pious men have more direct illumination from 
God than ordinary mortals. They are not only supposed to 
resemble Moses, but by virtue of long communion with the 
Divine, are more akin to God, a true child of God. He is the 
connected bond between God and his creatures and is the source 
of blessing and the fount of grace. Modern pietists have no 
saints of this sort unless the praying rabbi be so regarded, the 
Neo-Chassidim being keen on prayer.?° In their day, the medi- 
aeval pietists paid little regard to the prescribed hours at which 
public worship should be held. Prayer began when they got 
themselves into the proper devotional frame of mind. Frequent 
ablutions, perusal of mystical writings, introspective meditation, 
were the means by which they sought to gain the befitting mood, 
and often accompanied by the usual phenomena of religious 
excitement which is absent in the more restrained manners of 
our age. But there is little doubt that were demonstrations 
admissible in our modern “divine worship” the devotee might 
give visual illustrations of “cleaving to God” or “walking with 
God.” Some external manifestations of communion with God is 
the desideratum of the neo-chassidim who find American Judaism 
deficient in the production of ecstacy. 

The parallel is more real than apparent in the ancient and 
modern sect. Neo-chassidim have not yet evolved a Zaddik or 
“saint,” for example, to whom one can pilgrim as the faithful 
did in the Middle Age, one whose piety and goodness and self- 


* While there are no saints among American Jews today, there are 
equivalents, these being “spiritually-minded rabbis,” who are vegetarians, 
pacifists, and Tolstoian non-resisters. Their chiefest contribution to hu- 
manity is spirituality. In a material age that is worth while, too. 


REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS 259 


sacrifice made him a lesser deity, whom his devotees supported 
in royal estate. The neo-chassidim have not gone beyond set- 
ting up as a model the “spiritually-minded man.” One of this 
sort is set apart and distinct from his humanity also, by reason 
of his alleged “spirituality.” It is a difference only of degree. 
The characterization closely resembles the veneration bestowed 
by the Chassidim on their saintly “Zaddik.” 


Spirituality as a variant of this pietistic and mystical tendency, 
is a new attitude in American Judaism. The meaning of the 
word as interpreted in Jewish circles is hard to determine. In 
its best and truest sense, the word, spirituality, refers to a con- 
ception of other worldliness which contains in the full sweep 
of that conception notions that are not Jewish. The word and 
its implications belong to the theology of Christianity, with its 
distinctions of heaven and earth, as states and realities. Their 
theological world stages a conflict between two natures or 
worlds: one is earthly, the other heavenly or spiritual. This 
distinction permeates Christian theology and is directly de- 
scended from Plato’s eternal uncreated ideas.*? 


Christianity is a scheme of salvation to rescue the soul from 
sin, and is therefore antipodal to the contention of Judaism. 
The duality of man is thereby assumed which Jewish thinkers 
gradually abandoned in favor of a monistic concept, as implied 
in the unity and oneness of God. Christianity is grounded in 
Platonism with its division of heaven and earth. Plato evolved 
these concepts of the eternal ideas, unrelated to life and matters 
which have been responsible for misery untold and in a way 
retarded progress. Neo-platonism enlarged upon them until 
they separated the world into two mutually antagonistic realms: 
one holy, the other profane; a conception that is repugnant to 
Jewish thinkers—and made possible the mediaeval period when 
nothing was done on earth but prepare for Eternity. 

According to this theology, which is thoroughly un-Jewish, 
even the body is conceived in iniquity and born in sin, a notion 
so un-Jewish as to be repudiated, it is alleged by scholars,”? in 
the prayer, “O, Lord, the soul which thou hast given us came 
pure from Thee.” Christianity insists that the body must be 
redeemed by a sacrament and this sacrament is an acceptance 
of a belief in the atoning blood of Christ, whose spirit can be 


*“The Christian Platonists of Alexandria,” by C. Bigg, Lecture I. 
* Union Prayer Book, p. 65, 


260 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


brought into a believer by absorbing Him vicariously in this 
guise of bread and wine. Hence, to have the spirit of Christ in- 
dwelling in the soul, is to partake of Him spiritually, and this 
is attained by believing certain articles of faith about the Christ 
as_a theological dogma. abe Ha hg | 

The term spirituality has a definite meaning in Christianity, 
which is not translatable in terms of Judaism. The manifold 
attempts “to spiritualize Judaism” is, in the light of the origin 
of the concept, unJewish, because Judaism aims to consecrate 
earth and all that therein is to the use of man, and he in turn 
is to make worthy use of earth as well as himself and all mate- 
rial things. wily at hay ki 

Judaism is not unconscious, for all that, of an attitude of 
devotion, “Kewannah,” in which the worshipper is wholly en- 
grossed in reciting his prayers. But the passion for loose and 
abundant prayers, as is the vogue today, was never paramount 
among the Jews. There is good reason to conclude that pray- 
ers are regarded as incentives to stimulate deeds of benevo- 
lence; a call to duty and service; the still small voice whisper- 
ing to conscience. Prayer, as an end in itself, an ascetic indul- 
gence, or an aberration of religious ecstacy, has never taken root 
in Judaism.** . 

The attitude of devout absorption in reciting the ritual, known 
technically as kewannah, refers to a sincere regard for the con- 
tent of the prayer. It is a state of inwardness and is more a 
means of emptying the heart of every care in order to imagine 
one’s self standing in the presence of the divine majesty, the 
Shekina.*4 

This solicitude for spirituality, the consciousness of an in- 


** The analysis of the Jewish liturgy shows that the ritual itself as ar- 
ranged and historically developed, is replete with the appeals and reflec- 
tions that should inspire the main intent of the Jewish sermon, Reflection 
and thought were never repressed in Jewish prayers. Of the many pray- 
ers that ultimately were incorporated in the old prayer book from which 
the modern rituals, such as the Union Prayer Book (fashioned from Ein- 
horn’s Olath Tamid), all strike deep notes of thoughtful exposition. Heine 
is said to have characterized the worship of the Jews as a ceremony of 
singing metaphysics and praying archaeology. Were this the fact, it 
would constitute a distinguishing factor of Jewish worship. Mere out- 
pouring of sentiment, mere supplication for help and favor never satisfied 
the Jewish soul. 

°4The Talmud guards against the very suspicion of a “Judaized God” 
by insisting that every benediction be so phrased to read, “God, the Lord,” 
to which is added “King of the Universe.” The formula of the Psalms, 
God of Israel, is not adapted. Berokat, 40b. 


ee 


REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS 261 


dwelling of God came about after there had been implanted a 
construction of Judaism in terms of ethical monotheism in the 
hearts of the dominant element among American Jews. The 
mission of Reform Judaism was apparently fulfilled, as inti- 
mated in former chapters. At all events, there has been engen- 
dered in recent years a consciousness of unsatisfied yearning. 
Not satisfied with the mere abstracted ceremonialism of mod- 
ern synagogs a revival was sought in the guise of spirituality. 

The feeling of elation which ensues from the exercise of an 
emotional impuise was among the excitations sought by a people 
accustomed to storm and stress. The intellectuality of the syn- 
agog in America had bereft the worshipper of this psychic expe- 
rience. Again the appeal of the pulpit tended to depart from 
the stern realities of existence impelled perforce in the propa- 
ganda of Reform Movement, and aimed to please in a mild and 
innocent way a soporific congregation whom it sought to enter- 
tain instead of arouse. The pulpit began to dwell on those 
phases of activity disconnected from economic and political rela- 
tions. The preachment strove to be eminently safe and sane. 
The message of the pulpit was diverted from the stern rebuke 
of ethics and duty and consecration. The pulpit sought these 
cooling shades of safety in order to be safe and “spiritual” amid 
coddling easement. Aesthetics displaced ethics. All references 
to duties entailed in social relations of employer and employed 
and of mutual responsibility in each were avoided. Many rabbis 
were warned on threat of professional ostracism to refrain from 
criticizing either the theory of private property, the present eco- 
nomic system, or the administration of public affairs, when leg- 
islated in favor of the privileged class. 

The consciousness of this hiatus was the more keenly felt by 
the American Jews since they are heirs to a religion which is 
concerned in the relationships of man to man. Every phase of 
man’s existence is under the consecration of religion. Judaism 
does not segregate religion into a series of religious ceremonials 
of worship. The Temple of the Lord which the Jew enters to 
praise his God is an equipment station, outfitting him spirit- 
ually, for his pilgrimage through life. It is not an end in itself, 
but an agency for service. 

The instant the traditional intent of Judaism is ignored (and 
the traditional regard is simply a large and inclusive concern in 
the totality of human existence) an element alien to Judaism 
intrudes. This alien element, it has more than one manifestation, 


262 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


is a clamor for “spiritualizing Judaism.’** It marks a departure 
from the traditional function of the Jewish religion, which is to 
prepare men to live at peace here on earth among their fellow- 
men. The basis of the Torah, said R. Simlai, is the performance 
of deeds of loving kindness.?® This Talmudic dicta is an index 
of Jewish thought. 

Strictly applied, Judaism would not hesitate to urge the enact- 
ment of legislation that seeks to remove obsolete legal infringe- 
ments on human rights. The intent of the Jewish religion is to 
ennoble man. All that appertains to man’s welfare Judaism 
sought to foster. And to this end all Jewish ceremonials tend. 
This includes business and industry.2* There are brutalities 
countenanced in business today and in all fields of industry that 
are inhuman and debase rather than ennoble the worker, a con- 


*In this connection one must call attention to the movement known as 
Jewish Science, now being inaugurated. Alfred G. Moses, who has writ- 
ten a book on the subject, claims that it is “the science of life and reality” 
(p. 97). His treatise is a device to lead Christian Science into the back 
door of the synagog. It is better to realize that Jewish Science, he says, 
teaches that by correct understanding and application of the laws of 
mind, diseases may be gradually cured and he marshals for the therapeu- 
tics of mental healing the usual posse of spiritual constabulary: silence, 
affirmation, faith, and a liberal dosage of Curéism: every day in every way 
I am getting better and better. “Create in me a pure heart and a right 
spirit, renew Thou in me,” represents the Jewish standpoint, a proper 
mental attitude is essential for every act. To concentrate on this attitude 
and exalt it into a technique of healing is another thing. Judaism per- 
mits and contains all the elements of healing in stressing action and deed 
done collectively, not individually. The natural discharge of the duties 
entailed in living contain within themselves curative properties. To em- 
ploy formulas of escetic mintage, or incantations, does not prosper one 
much. The movement is interesting, in that it reveals the possibilities 
and potentialities of Jewish consciousness, and is an emanation of the 
pietistic revival and mysticism outflowing from the reactionary measures 
instituted against Reform Judaism. 

ThOOtawal4as 

“The social element in the Sabbath observance, it is now recognized, 
is the original contribution made by Judaism to civilization. The Sab- 
bath was in a large measure the agency whereby the human race was 
humanized. Wherever the Sabbath was introduced, it became a bulwark 
of defense and a protection for the manhood of the working man. The 
institution of Sabbath protected the weaker against the exploiting selfish- 
ness of the economically stronger. More than this, the Sabbath is the 
patent of man’s nobility. Through it he declares his freedom. It is the 
proclamation of Labor’s high dignity. God labors and rests. In labor 
and rest man expresses his heritage of godliness and freedom. Labor 
freed from the tyranny of slavery is creative. On the Sabbath, read in 
the light of the social implications imputed to it in the Jewish religion, 
the human being observing the Sabbath, expresses his sovereignty over 
nature. 





REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS 263 


dition calling for correction. Judaism never repudiated Labor. 
It emphasized the value and worthiness of Labor. But, con- 
nected with this injunction, followed the corollary—that the 
laborer was worthy of his hire.?® Legal fiction renders justifi- 
able, according to legal decisions, the notion that wages award 
the worker. The maladjustments of industrialism are many. 
The serious fault with the present system is in this field and 
in the kindred realm of motivation and incentive. Beholden as 
Judaism has been to the laws of morality, there has never been 
such rigidity of legal process and procedure as characterizes the 
decisions rendered by our modern courts in regard to labor. 
Decisions have been handed down which do not inspire respect 
for civil law, but embitter the citizens of the nation against the 
bar, and feed the suspicion that “special privilege” rather than 
justice dictated the opinion. A religion so intensely human as 
Judaism is ever on the side of the dispossessed, the exploited, 
the helpless victim of oppression, whatever its nature. Hence 
the dismay occasioned by the cult of mysticism which is now 
invading the synagogs of America becomes the more offensive 
in light of traditions, of social justice inhcrent in the Jews. This 
neo-chassidic tendency portends weakness rather than strength, 
since Judaism does not pamper emotionalism but engages in a 
combat for decency and a just regard for every son of Adam. 


Rationalistic as Judaism has ever aimed to be, there has ever 
been a current of mysticism withal flowing through Jewish 
thought, as there has been in Christianity, Buddhism and all 
historical religions.2® Dr. Kohler says the mystics accepted lit- 
erally the anthropmorphic pictures of Deity in the Bible and 
did not care how much they might affect the spirituality and 
unity of God. The philosophic schools had contended against 
the anthropomorphic views of the mystics, and set up a philo- 
sophic concept of God, man and the world) But when ration- 
alism had spent its force, the reaction came in the form of the 
Kabbalah with its secret lore.*° Aweary of the combats with the 
stern abstractions of philosophy, there germinated a demand 
for a God whose revelation brought the solace pendent on an 


28 Liberal Judaism and Social Service, by Harry S. Lewis, pp. 151, sqq. 

“An impartial Jewish theology must take cognizance of both sides: it 
must include the mysticism of an Isaac Luria and a Sabbathai Horowitz 
as well as the rationalism of Albo and Leo da Modena. Jewish Theology, 
by Kohler, p. 14. 

” Opus Cit., p. 89. 


264 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


exultant faith in His nearness, reality and indwelling in the soul 
of each.** 

The mystics of Germany and Safed, Palestine, opposed the 
one-sidedness of legalism and intellectualism, says Dr. Kohler, 
and endeavored to instill elements of deeper devotion into the 
Jewish soul through the introduction of their Kabbalah. Their 
excursion in esoteric tradition was but the reaction to the exces- 
sive rationalism of the Spanish-Arabic period. Later he says: 
“As the ultimate source of religion is not reason, but the heart, 
so the cultivation of the intellect at the expense of the emotions 
can only be harmful to the faith. The legalism and casuistry 
of the Talmud and Codes appealed too much to the intellect, 
disregarding the deeper emotional sources of religion and moral- 
ity; on the other hand, the mysticism of the Kabbalists over- 
emphasized the emotional element and eliminated much of the 
rational basis of Judaism. The menace in the movement today 
is of this caliber, it vaunts mysticism instead of social justice 
as the fulfillment of Judaism.*? | 

Mysticism attempts to create a supersensuous world and that 
is the menace engendered by it for those who, like the neo- 
chassidim, encourage this excursion into the unreal. The peril 
their appeal for mysticism projects is the denial of reality in 
this world, and their acceptance of the alleged verities of a 
supersensuous world, with which they have direct sensory com- 
munication as the ultimate good of all existence. Platonism to 
be sure has never been accepted in Judaism. They seek to cre- 
ate this supersensuous world of reality in which action is dis- 
placed by meditation and hence favor “silence” in the synagog as 
an evidence of spirituality. Contact’ with this supersensuous 
realm of reality awards one with such bliss as is held in store 
~~ *Rationalism in the outcropping of the philosophies projected during 
the heyday of Spanish Jewry was dependent on freedom, and freedom was 
the lot of the Jews of that era. Synchronous with the advent of the inqui- 
sition trooped the mystic hosts, Periods of persecution have ever been 
fertile fields for pietism, mysticism and chassidic cults. The oppressive 
wave of reaction in this country and Europe tends to stimulate the mystic 
proclivities of the Jew. In those perilous moments, the harassed and 
hounded seek refuge in other realms. The devout Christian has a perma- 
nent anchor in heaven. The Jew, having abandoned his original “Gan 
Eden,” devises a new one and labels it “mysticism,” “spirituality,” “Piety,” 
“indwelling consciousness of God.” It matters not what name is carved on 
the entablature of this airy edifice, it represents for all practical purposes 
a haven of escape, a means of release from the pressure of. persecution. 


82 An opinion shared by A. Cropsey in his article, “The Shame of the 
Churches,” The Nation, Jan. 16/24. ' 





REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS 265 


for those who exercise their emotions. On them is bestowed 
greater solace than the hard and harsh garishness of earth ad- 
mits and in the seclusion of their parlor or pew they may obtain 
intimations of God’s indwelling consciousness, all of which is 
useful when it leads to action. 


On the side of psychology, the mystics assume that in addition 
to the habitual manner of viewing the world there is another 
of which they have vivid sensuous sensations. Their transcen- 
dental world is the reality while our ordinary area of conceptial 
thought is the unreal. This, of course, means that there are two 
processes of thought: the ordinary impressions arising from the 
senses and another transcending this, permitting closer immedi- 
acy with an alleged reality than is afforded by our senses. 


The fallacy of mysticism, whether Jewish or non-Jewish, is 
the setting up of a dualism in our nature which psychology no 
longer accepts. Mysticism seeks to establish just this dual 
relationship in man and it is as futile, as futile as spirituality 
although a modern rabbi high in rabbinical circles said: ‘We 
must revive our soul and bring it back to life by feeling and 
nourishing it with spiritual fare; real wholesome food such as 
will save our souls from death.” Yet no thought is so unJew- 
ish as this conception of duty and doctrine, removed from action 
toward rendering earth more serviceable for mankind. 

“There is among American Jews today a very real spiritual 
hunger and unrest,” says Dr. S. S. Wise, “a hunger which 
orthodoxy as it is cannot satisfy, an unrest which Liberal or 
Reform Judaism does not avail to compose; a hunger and unrest 
which are due in no small part to an explicable and even justified 
discontent with the synagog, orthodox and liberal alike.” One 
would like to have more evidences than a mere verbal accusation. 

To appease this hunger, spirituality or mysticism (cults that 
are anti-Jewish) are projected. Yet this is not the ambition 
of Judaism. “These are the things,” says the Mishnah, 
the fruits of which a man enjoys in this world: honoring father 
and mother, the practice of charity, timely attendance at the 
house of study, hospitality to wayfarers, visiting the sick, dower- 
ing, attending the dead and making peace between man and his 
fellow. But the study of the law is equal to them all.* 

Rabbinical Judaism proffers a suggestion in this admonition 
for more wholesome and useful things than clamor for spiritual- 


* Singer’s Prayer Book, p. 5, 


266 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


ity. In fulfilling these social duties, man serves his humanity. 
Piety among Jews ever consisted in social service.** For the 
purpose of the Torah was to make man love and serve this 
humanity. All gifts of mind or purpose or property were but 
loaned to man that he might dedicate them to the uses of his 
humanity. Whomsoever in fidelity and gladness of heart will- 
ingly served his humanity, manifested the only real genuine 
piety Judaism fostered, Love of man {fulfilled all the obligations 
of spirituality. They preached fulfillment of the commandments 
that ultimately their humanity might be bettered. More than 
this spirituality can not do. 

There is still another spirituality which is indigenous to 
American Judaism and this conception of spirituality, if this 
term be adopted, calls upon each to remain true to what his 
Creator intended him to be. Whoever fulfills himself and real- 
izes the gifts and faculties implanted in his nature is working 
with God for the establishment of the kingdom of righteous- 
ness. God is manifested through the work of man and this is 
the intent of the implication that man is fashioned in the image 
of God. To conquer the earth and till it is to have dominion 
over the earth. Without man this earth would be a wilderness. 
Upon man is imposed the duty to alter this condition. Man is 
to be a creator. He is to transform this earth from uninhabit- 
ableness to habitableness, and this transformation is only pos- 
sible by labor. Work is sacred. Only through working can man 
become the image of God upon earth. 

As the Torah was given as a covenant, so was work ordered 
as a covenant, it is said in the Aboth of Rabbi Nathan. Work 
is a covenant representing the moral relation between God and 
man. If, then, to work is a covenant, work is a fundamental 
doctrine of the Jewish religion. In the Sabbath ordinance the 
work of six days precedes the celebration of the Sabbath day 
of rest. The Sabbath day can only be truly observed and 
enjoyed when it follows six days of labor and attests to the 
excellence of the work accomplished. 

Work fashions us in the image of God, Judaism contends. 
When any one carries out his divine intent by exercising such 
abilities and powers as possesses and contributes his share to 
the common wealth of humanity or participates in the efforts 

* Liberal Judaism and Social Service, p. 66. 


“ This construction is an elaboration of doctrines expounded by Samuel 
Hirsch in his ‘‘Catechism.” 


a 


REACTIONARY MOVEMENTS 267 


of subduing earth to the use of man, he fills a place in society. 
The consciousness of his labor fills him with dignity. He enjoys 
the esteem of his fellows and the consciousness of labor worthily 
performed creates in him a certain self-esteem that is as valuable 
as piety. The work of conquering the earth and subduing all 
things earthly is not the task of an individual alone, but is that 
labor enjoined on all mankind. To labor with one’s fellow-men 
is as essential as to do one’s own work. In fact this collabora- 
tion would provide a common aim and impose a share of service 
upon all engaged in transforming the earth. It is synonymous 
with the modern slogan: “service, above self!” 

To transform the earth and make it fit for human habitation 
is the sort of “spirituality” Judaism recognizes as worthy of 
cultivation. For this sort of spirituality assists in the work 
of creation and each of us thus become partners with God in 
His unending process of creation. That work can never be 
completed. Whatever has been attained in one age is only the 
material offered by that generation to their posterity, who in 
turn must transform it anew to the wider demands and uses 
made by each new generation. For man did not come forth 
from the hands of the Creator either good or bad. His goodness 
consists only in not feeling satisfied with what he finds in the 
world or within himself, and the effort put forth to make mate- 
rials and himself more useful. In an endeavor to improve the 
circumstances and conditions of earth, in attaining a greater 
perfection himself in whatever he has ventured, and in securing 
a better living condition for humanity upon earth, there is dis- 
played all the spirituality Judaism can vouchsafe. In its prag: 
matic intent, Judaism is in accord with modern thought, so fat 
as this doctrine is concerned, 


From this injunction of living, it follows that to oppress the 
laborer in any form of tyranny or domination, is to belie God 
and defile the image of God in the wrong doer as well as him 
or her wronged. How can man walk in the ways of God, or 
even “cleave to God,” and countenance the defilement of earth 
and man in our day? Man is a worker with God. He is a 
partner of the Holy One, Blessed be He, in the work of creation. 
The consciousness of having lived up to this thought is genuine 
spirituality and the highest reward for man. 

Blessed is the man who has found his work. Let a man find 
his work and his work shall make him free, when together with 


268 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


his fellows they labor to subdue earth for the use of man. This 
construction of life has wide and far-reaching applications. Let 
no one mistake the significance of these constructions, Far 
easier of fulfillment is “‘spirituality” that cleaves to God and 
stays put. But it involves no labor, Judaism insists on stirring 
man to partake of the creative force engaged in bettering earth 
and man’s lot, in uprooting the inhumanity within man. Who 
shall say that he or she gifted with artistic inspiration, is not 
spiritual when responsive to their genius, they paint a picture; 
write a poem; sing a song; carve a statue; make something by 
hand? Who is not spiritually-minded when planting a garden; 
a tree; a flower? Why are not the sons of toil equally spiritual 
with the neo-chassidim whose only claims of distinction are their 
vocal chords? Spirituality is esoteric in Judaism save in the 
light of labor. There is bound to be more cooperation in move- 
ments tending to conquer earth literally and figuratively. There 
is sure to be more participation in whatever movements mani- 
fest the truth of man’s partnership with God. This is to be a 
better place for all of us to live in and it is to be a labor of 
love for our humanity that will make earth worth living, a 
garden as H. C. Wells intimated earth was planned to be, neither 
man nor beast shall trample down. To this end neo-chassidim 
and all spiritually-minded men and women might well direct 
their energies and talents. For let none forget the words of 
Rabbi Chananya, son of Akashya who said: The Holy One, 
blessed be He, was pleased to make Israel worthy; wherefore 
he gave them a copious Torah and many commandments,* as 
it is said, “It pleased the Lord, for his righteousness’ sake to 
magnify the Torah and make it honorable.” (Isaiah xlii, 21.) 


* Also Targum Song of Songs to 1:10. 


ee 


DHE ONEX TS CAGE 
IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF 
AMERICAN JUDAISM 


The foregoing chapters have endeavored to establish the thesis 
of an American Judaism. Its history, content, its achievement 
and reactions or frustrations have been outlined—from the view- 
point of one individual, albeit that interpretation aimed to be 
objective, impersonal, while at the same time conscious of liberal 
inclinations and reform proclivities. The argument sustained 
the assumption that there is a bona fide American Judaism 
which, it was conceded, is a literary phrase intended to capti- 
vate the patriotic pride of the Jewish people of America and 
means literally that there is no geographical divisions of Juda- 
ism, but that Judaism is manifested variously in various peoples 
everywhere and in these United States finds expression among 
a large portion of the Jewish population in terms of what has 
been unfortunately labelled “Reform” but might be designated 
as Prophetic or Liberal Judaism. 

This prophetic construction or continuation of Jewish inspira- 
tion, it is shown, is no aberration of Jewish genius, but a ful- 
fillment of the evolutionary process characteristic of this phe- 
nomena. Judaism has ever been in a state of flux. The spirit 
of God, the consciousness of the indwelling of a spirit, with one’s 
self, that makes for righteousness and relates one in a cove- 
nantal kinship with a non-Self in terms of love and devotion, 
is the quintessential core of the Jewish religion. This covenan- 
tal bond enjoins such behavior as tends to increase peace in 
the world and is the prerequisite for establishment of the 
brotherhood of man. It makes for democracy, political and 
economic, since the impersonation of these ideas summarize the 
mass-apperception of the God-concept among the Jews today, 
among those, at least, of the Liberal and Prophetic wing, who 
entertain any speculation whatosever on matters of this sort. 
This view, while modern, is a fulfillment of prophecy in the 
sense that ever since that inspiring moment when Elijah lashed 
by the fury of the elements heard the still small voice telling 
him the source of authority, until this last moment of recorded 


269 


270 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


time, Judaism has enlarged from within cardinal doctrines of 
doing justly, loving mercy and walking the earth with reveren- 
tial mien. And thus being in harmony with the natural order 
of the universe, the creative genius of the Jewish people attrib- 
uted freedom to God and set Him and them above nature. 


American Judaism is therefore not an end in itself, but a 
medium or an expression whereby the Jewish people identify 
themselves with their God who is the symbolization of those 
deeds of love and justice, of truth and enlightenment that liberate 
men from ignorance, selfishness and bigotry, and so coordinates 
them with the universal will or the natural order of the world. 
This interpretation, in contrast to orthodoxy which recognized 
the covenantal relationship in terms of inviolable laws to fulfill 
which constituted Judaism as orthodoxy defined it. Orthodoxy 
reduced the religion of the Jewish people to a series of codes, 
discharging which sanctified and enhallowed the life of the 
Jews as the myriads of martyred Jews and Jewesses testify, but 
it also contracted life. It hedged them behind their ghetto walls, 
and, while the world was narrowed by superstition and tyranny, 
safeguarded them on all their ways. But in the glow of toler- 
ance, and warmed by the sun of political democracy, the larger 
contacts with humanity demanded larger sanctions. These sanc- 
tions were not imposed on the Jewish people, from without, but 
obtained from within Judaism. The potentialities of Judaism 
liberated and released the Jews and enabled them to find their 
places in the sun. 

Responsive to this impulse the Jews re-read their literature 
and history. From critical study of these, their election, as 
providentially designed, to be a priest people, which is in other 
words the ethical urge among humanity, was reaffirmed. Like- 
wise their historical purpose and identity as a people invested 
with this momentuous task was stressed. This role assigned 
them a spiritual objective, an ideal affecting all humanity, which 
lent meaning to their lives. This task is imposed on the Jewish 
group by the antecedent forces of history. These conditions 
precedent circumvent cosmopolitanism or a colorless humani- 
tarianism. The Jew is a distinct factor in civilization. He is 
that element which works for humanization or love. He upholds 
the liberation of man from tyrannies, be these political, religious 
or economic. His God is conceived of in terms of freedom and 
is superior to nature, master of circumstance and condition. 


ee 


THE NEXT STAGE IN DEVELOPMENT 271 


Therefore, as God gave the Jew the Sabbath as a protest against 
mechanization of man, and in defiance of natural law, to the 
end that man may be enthroned and made little less than the 
angels, with dominion over the works of The Creator. Man is 
accordingly crowned with glory and honor. Born a free man, he 
is fashioned in the image of a free God. 

To proclaim this truth, the Jew was summoned. His appoint- 
ment challenges him to battle against error and brutal selfish- 
ness. His arena is the world, and his foeman those who hate 
their fellow-man. Being annointed with the oil of a consecrated 
purpose, the Jew could not, in loyalty to his providential 
appointment and messianic mission, segregate himself within 
the confines of a country which he outgrew. American Judaism 
has therefore never been nationalistic in the sense that it 
assumed Judaism to be an end in itself, to realize which one 
might retire to an outworn state of previous servitude, even if 
this realm be storied with tender memories and is enshrined in 
the affections of all Israel as their cradle land. American Juda- 
ism has been consistently anti-Zionistic, although the pathos 
of Israel’s suffering in Europe has always moderated the inten- 
sity of opposition to the Zionistic propaganda. A hard-pressed 
and long-suffering people often accepted the refuge of Zion as 
their last resort. Whether rational or fanciful, Palestine spelled 
hope. It is no wonder that Zion’s national song is “The Hope.” 
He is without charity in his heart who does not sympathize with 
the zeal of the Zionists for a haven of refuge. When all the 
world has gone mad with rabid nationalism, it is natural that 
the Jew, the sorriest victim thereof, should seek some means 
of an escape to save himself alive. To this extent one can aid 
the Zionists, but not their policy. 

The upbreak of the Zionist scheme of national restoration, 
or a politically secured homeland in Palestine resulted in depriv- 
ing many of that following in this country of any Jewish interest. 
Instead of prospering Reform Judaism, expanding it and using 
its technique for the furtherance of social justice and the libera- 
tion from economic despotism of the host of their humanity, 
many ignored it. The Reform Movement was halted and held 
in a state of arrested development. Being unable to expand, it 
retrogressed. The reaction of American Judaism, manifested 
in mysticism, pietism and “the advent of the layman,” who has 
put business in religion and sells religion as if it were a com- 


272 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


modity of merchandise, warn the devout and sincere that this 
spiritual heritage of the pioneers may go the way of all flesh 
unless it be vitalized in the life of those chosen from among all 
peoples to exemplify it in their lives by service unto man. “For 
I am God and not man, the Holy One in the midst of thee,” 
said Hosea’ to his generation, and this injunction has not staled 
nor its imperative fulfillment become flat through changing 
years. This summons still calls all Israel, no less than the Jews 
of these United States. 


The outline of American Judaism set forth in this blue print 
of description explained the content and achievements, the reac- 
tions it remains for this concluding chapter to prognosticate 
the possible forthcoming events on the next stage of its develop- 
ment. It was shown that retrogression aimed to revive the out- 
worn and inadequate. All progress depends on the inadequacy 
of the impulse and since the ceremonial was cast in the discard 
it has no appeal. Discontent craves new stimulation. These 
stimuli have often been emotional with excesses that jeopardize 
the healthy naturalness of the Jewish religion. Judaism does 
not regard religion as something imposed on man in fear or 
coercion, but the natural method of living in society. Hence 
protests have been registered against the unnatural emotionalism 
which regards religion as an exercise of a personal thrill or 
elation, and not a duty towards humanity, the blending of the 
self with the social whole. Judaism is a social religion. Judaism 
and humanity are synonymous. 


Particular pains were taken to force these truths home, since 
in light of its achievements American Judaism enjoyed unusual 
opportunity to illumine these present years with the brightness 
of this inspiration which, read in terms of the social sciences, 
is thoroughly modern, thoroughly social and free from the dross 
of selfish individualism and rabid nationalism. The Jew is in 
a position today to declare his message beyond the walls of the 
synagog and join forces with his fellowmen who feel that there 
is no wealth but life, and to enhance life the mission of each. 
All humanity should be arrayed in the struggle to dethrone 
privilege and give unto all their due. To assist in attaining that 
state of industrialism when production for use and not for 
profit will be the normal order. The Jews can well find place 
and cause as a substitute for his outworn, exhausted, rabbinism 


"Hosea 11:9, 


THE NEXT STAGE IN DEVELOPMENT 273 


and nationalism. It is in this spirit that a forecast is proffered. 

There is a natural curiosity imbedded in all of us to forecast 
or at least to anticipate the future. It is with an eye on the 
future that we predicate many statements of a political or eco- 
nomic nature. This applies to individuals as well as groups, 
and since at no time has Judaism shut itself off from the world, 
and more particularly at present, there is a natural inclination 
to speculate on the possible eventualities of Jewish thinking and 
activity in the next few years. Beyond the near horizon of the 
immediate future it is not given mortal man to penetrate, nor 
is it even desirable. 

In attempting then to project the possible tendencies of the 
near future, the endeavor has been to avoid the role of prophet 
to which no one is heir, whether a son of a prophet or not. 
Given the data of reality, the currents of Jewish thought in the 
next decades are liable to flow in those channels cut by Jewish 
tradition? and in accordance with the religious genius of the Jew 
as it has developed in his consciousness through the ages. Juda- 
ism in America being the outcome of processes released in other 
ages, as it has been shown, the next stage will in turn be an 
unfolding and development of what has come to consciousness 
here and now in the present generation of American Jews. 

It is therefore not a matter of wild speculation nor a fantastic 
conjecture to outline the contour (on the spiritual plane) of that 
Judaism most likely to be affected by the sequence of philosophy. 
Having steered clear of the Charybdis of nationalism and the 
Scylla of soporific pietism, the American Jew is now able to 
walk under the burden of his religious obligations valiantly, at 
least with more self-reliance than the halting gait effected in 
the past. He is likewise assured of the sure foundation of his 
Americanism. No self-respecting Jew, rich or poor, regards his 
Judaism in the light of a baneful misfortune ladelled out from 
the caldron of fate. Those American Jews whose religion 
enables them to do justly, to love their humanity and walk this 
western continent hand in hand with their fellow American 
citizens, do not consider Judaism a misfortune no more than a 
Protestant believes Protestantism a misfortune or the Catholic, 
Catholicism. Religion is being interpreted by all as a harmon- 
ization of the self with a non-self—a coordination of man’s will 

2“The road of tradition which is ultimately that of Instinct and the road 


of Reason are the two roads by which we may travel towards moral ends 
of life.’—Havelock Ellis. 


274 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


with God. European cynicism, bred of poor digestion, malicious 
nationalism, oppressive imperialism, and cut-throat trade com- 
petition was guilty of embittering the Jews against Judaism in 
many instances, and sired a coterie of atheists, nihilists, mate- 
rialists, whose deity was economic deteriorism. There is no occa- 
sion for these harsh doctrines in America, and the American 
Jew rejects corrupting cynicism as a European custom to be 
discarded along with kings, princelets and the trumpery of 
knighthood and the oppression that went along with the system 
of alleged superior beings. 

In the unfolding of Judaism there are ascertained methods 
which have been developed by centuries of practice. There are 
certain attitudes of life acceptable to Judaism whether these are 
evolved within the group or adopted from alien peoples. What- 
ever phase of thought is destined to predominate, the genius of 
Judaism will not cease to protest against attitudes and values, 
inhospitable if not antagonistic, to the fructifying impulses of 
Jewish thought and the Jewish outlook on the meaning of life 
and what message life imparts, which, as has been explained, are 
dominatingly social. 

This, in the light of Jewish tradition, is incumbent on the 
Jew today, and there has not been a let up in the opposition 
of the Jew against those versions of life (Paulinianism, for 
example, or Christian Science) which stultify humanity instead 
of stimulating the sons of man to rise on stepping stones of their 
dead selves to higher things in the service of their humanity. 

The protest against a religion of somnambulance, such as 
Pietism, is weaponed with rebuke against the perverted chican- 
ery of foisting emotionalism on unguarded and undisciplined 
minds of men and women, because it does not lend the agency 
of service to subdue the earth and render it more habitable. 


A protest equally vigorous is directed against revived nation- 
alism which is the front and base of Zionism, and Zionism is a 
menace, as Henry Morgenthau® declared, to the Jews of America 
if not to all the world, since it is contrary to the destiny, the 
“daemon” of Judaism and a man’s “daemon” is his God, said 
Heraclitus. Judaism in America is once and for all time unalter- 
ably and irrevocably opposed to political Zionists, because the 
Jew, as embodiment of his religion, is summoned to identify 
and symbolize God and His attributes in his service towards 


*>“All in a Life Time,” by H. Morgenthau. 


a 


THE NEXT STAGE IN DEVELOPMENT 275 


humanity—his collective action for the commonwealth, and not 
to engage in a political excursion in material and physical 
domains. 

American Judaism is opposed to systems of thought which 
verge on superstitions. Christian Science is a conspicuous exam- 
ple of a movement whose ambition is selfish, parochial and 
reactionary; whose appeal is rooted in a feeling of indulgent 
comfort and smug security* and not in service to humanity. 

In protesting against these tendencies of our own era, a certain 
fidelity to Jewish tradition is displayed. For those scholars 
who have investigated the origin of the prayer book, substan- 
tiate the thesis that the composers of these liturgical outpour- 
ings of sentiment and confidence in man took care always to 
avow those convictions in the covenantal relation and kinship olf 
God with man. Judaism takes issue with the theology and 
dogma of church or mosque, and announces in no uncertain 
terms an unyielding adherence to a faith in human welfare and 
social action. 

That the world, for example, is under sin, a favorite confes- 
sion of Paulinian Christianity, is contrary to Jewish thinking 
and rejected in the prayer: “My God the soul which Thou 
gavest me came pure from Thee. Thou didst create it. Thou 
didst form it. Thou didst breathe it unto me; Thou preserved 
it within me and Thou wilt take it from me, but wilt restore 
it unto me hereafter. So long as the soul is within me, I will 
give thanks unto Thee, O Lord, my God and God of my fathers.”® 


The emphatic thought of this prayer, be it noted, is directed 
against Christian dogmatics that man is conceived in sin and 
must be “redeemed” thru the blood of the Christ, and so is the 
touching declaration that the soul of each mortal come pure 
from God’s hand. Every participant in public worship repeats 
this assertion. It is a characteristic protest against the contrary 
assumption of the church and fills the worshipper with the con- 
sciousness that he is a “partner with God in the daily work of 
creation.” 

Another familiar prayer of the ritual, “O Lord of all World, 
we cannot plead the merit of our deeds before thee,” also rings 
a protest against the assertion of Paulinian dogmatics that the 
Jews rely on their righteousness or self-sufficiency as we might 


4“Judaism and Christian Science,” Yr. Bk. C.C.A.R., Vol. 22. 
®* Union Prayer Book, p. 66. 


276 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


say today. It is indignantly denied in this prayer: “Not on 
account of righteousness do we presume to make supplication 
unto thee. But whatever we are we are through Thee and Thy 
divine aid.’””® 

In view of the protest evoked by challenging the fundamental 
assumption of Judaism, it is not too much to say that almost 
every dissertation on the contents of Jewish philosophy and the- 
ology was inspired by injecting into Jewry influences alien to it. 
This is as true of Biblical days as it is in the case of the teachers 
of the Middle Age and provides us a method in our own period 
of establishing the drift of Jewish thought. It will take on the 
aspects of protest and at the same time present the thesis of the 
Jewish religion. 

To orientate Judaism anew in these days and from this survey 
is the particular engagement at hand. To obtain intimations 
of the direction that craft must be steered in its voyage on the 
sea of unborn time, it is necessary to charter the currents on the 
sea of modern thought. This is obvious, if we wish to weigh 
tendencies, we must measure movements. 

Those influences that have crossed the boundary lines of Juda- 
ism train in the camps of non-Jews. All our constructions and 
philosophies bear the imprint of non-Jews as the philosophers 
among modern Jews, such as Husick’ and Neumark,® explain. 
It is said that the analysis of the tenets of Reform Judaism, as 
David Einhorn dictated, shows unmistaken traces of the German 
philosopher of transcendental idealism, namely Frederick 
Shelling. It is well known that Samuel Hirsch employs the 
Helgelian method to correct Hegel and expose the fallacy of his 
thesis, that of an ultimate and final true religion which the state 
philosopher of Prussia had argued was Christianity. 

These illustrations show that Jewish philosophy is responsive 
to those various theories current at various periods, as the form 
of expression wherewith to announce the content of the Jewish 
revelation, that is, the Jewish Religion. We must inventory the 
prevailing philosophic and cultural movements of our age in 
order to obtain an insight into those systems of thought that 
influence Judaism in America. One system of thinking still active, 
despite benighted and absurd opposition in backwoods communi-. 


SOpus) Cite ‘ip. 67: 
™The Philosophy of Judaism, by I. Husick. 
"The History of Jewish Philosophy, by D. Neumark. 


THE NEXT STAGE IN DEVELOPMENT 277 


ties and men, is the evolutionary method. By this system Jewish 
scholars have read the development of Judaism. A gradual unfold- 
ing of a religious instinct coming to consciousness in the Jew in 
terms of service to humanity which he is called upon to do as 
a condition of living. 

In the middle and nineteenth century, 1859, Darwin upset the 
established theology of the “Church” by the publication of his 
“Origin of Species.” It was the most revolutionary and illumi- 
nating theory ever framed to account for the creation of the 
world. A veritable biography of earth and those who tenanted 
it was written therein, and the pedigree of all creatures regis- 
tered by means of it. A few years after the appearance of this 
startling volume, every domain of human action and thought 
was ploughed over in new explorations for knowledge, and to be 
explained in light of the process or law governing their growths. 
Old truths were reset in light of the new bearings revealed by 
evolution, and since many of these “truths” dealt with dogmatic 
religion, a new statement of religion was forced. A new story 
of heaven and earth, of man and animals, of religion and moral- 
ity ; of civilization and society had to be learned. 


As late as February 1922, more than half a century after the 
appearance of the “Origin of Species,” legislation was sought 
in Kentucky against teaching evolution or any aspect of it within 
that commonwealth.® This measure indicated the great peril the 
“Church” feared that the new wine brimming in the cup of 
knowledge would make the old communion element unpalpable 
and this is the bone of contention between “Fundamentalists” 
and “Modernists.” In consequence of this distaste for the old 
dogmatic version of a spontaneous creation as outlined in Gen- 
esis, it was feared God’s altars would crumble and the pillars of 
morality would be weakened, by accepting a theory that all 
came to pass as an unfolding from within outward according to 
an inner urge or energy. 


American Judaism, or any phase of Judaism, has nothing to 
fear from an evolutionary interpretation of life and nature, since 
creation is called into being according to the will of God True 
it is that the theory of evolution does not comport with the story 
of creation recorded in the first chapters of Genesis. For this 


° Other states have legislated against the teaching of evolution and admit 
only such teachings on creation as set forth in Genesis. 
7 Singer Prayer Book, p. 3. 


278 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


book is not, nor did it ever pretend to be an infallible manual 
of natural science, geology or anthropology, as the Fundamen- 
talists would manipulate it. The use made of these chapters in 
Christianity and that interpretation put on them by Judaism 
differ. To the Christian, Genesis provides the account of the 
“first man” and his first earthly abode. Yet this is a myth and is 
not countenanced by Judaism.14_ In the primitive fall of the “first 
Adam,” which is a ritual dogma of Christian theology ; American 
Jews have no concern. For the non-Jew this is all-essential. If 
the first Adam was not actual, as the science of biology and 
anthropology argue—there being a gradual evolution towards 
man, why the need of the second Adam? If the sin of the first 
Adam, who could not possibly have been in existence—there 
being no first man, did not make all of this progeny co-defend- 
ants for this act, then there is no need for a second Adam, in 
this case Christ, to justify by his death and vicarious atone- 
ment all the sons of man in the eyes of God, very much after 
the conception of the “Goel,” redeemer or ransomer of semitic- 
religion. Judaism teaches nothing of this sort, a personal 
redeemer, but of his own will man eschews the evil and accepts 
the good. If the sons of man come by any attribute naturally or 
by reason of their birth, it is not sin, but goodness. Original 
goodness expresses much more truthfully the belief of Judaism 
than does original sin. Above all, man is born free, is empowered 
himself to express his genius. According to the tenets of that 
faith, American Judaism announces, the ascent of man is more 
in alignment with the order of his creation than his moral 
descent. The natural order of man is a progressive one, towards 
a fuller and better life, and larger participation in the activities 
and engagements of life. As he engages in these movements, 
he outdraws his genius and excercises those talents and qualities 
which identify him. Thus employed, he grows into a clearer 
truth of his destiny and harmonizes his will with the creative 
will of God, which permeates the universe in the guise of energy. 

The account of the creation of man given in Scripture’? may 
be dismissed or revered as poetry. As poetry there is in this 
version a wonderful revelation. In it there has come to con- 
sciousness one fundamental conception in the religious expres- 


“ American Judaism accepts the Genesis and Biblical stories as Folk- 
lore, touched with ethical and religious injunctions. 


* Folk-Lore and the Old Testament, by J. G. Frazer, Chap. I. 


THE NEXT STAGE IN DEVELOPMENT 279 


sion of American Judaism: Man is made in the image of God! 
What is attributed to God in amplitude is incarnated in man. 

There is a notion abroad today that man creates God in his 
own image. Artist that he is, this is most likely true. Granted 
for argument’s sake that this is so, what kind of God has the 
genius of the Jew fashioned? The God as revealed in the 
image of their ideal-as set forth in Genesis is also Creator. Man 
then, insofar as he is made in the image of his Creator, responds 
to the cosmic urge and creates. In conjunction with his fellow- 
man they convert earth and make all that is thereon useful for 
man; that is, aligns himself to his inner impulse that pushes and 
prods him to express himself in whatever form he wills for the 
common purpose of subduing the earth and rendering it habit- 
able for humanity. In our day, the speculative interpretation 
of God, man and the world, is told in terms of this philosophy 
of energy. A conception of God as cosmic energy carries with 
it the view of the human being as a creature, endowed with the 
potentialities which is manifested in a service for humanity. 
Energy is thus effected through ethical actions. The cosmic 
urge in the conscience of the Jew is known as benevolence, love, 
justice, all inhibitions of the impulse the exercising of which 
renders ethical all deeds of man. 

American Judaism runs no risk in adhering to the method of 
evolution. For by following this method its future is forestalled. 
Surely no reaction is so pronounced today as the inclination of 
the Jewish nationalists to mistrust American Judaism because 
it is aligned with modern philosophy. The neo-chassidim there- 
fore dismiss American Judaism on the assumption that it is a 
product of the exile and hence un-Jewish. They will have none 
of it as a religion exacting a consecration to humanity, but are 
literally calling in stentorian tones for “the good old faith of our 
fathers,” for a “Revival of Judaism,” for conservatism! 


Now the good old faith of our fathers and all reactionary 
measures are ritualistic Judaism with the elaborate performance 
of rites and ceremonies of ancient lineage reintroduced in the 
home and synagog. One of the modern curiosities which the 
evolutionary theory sponsored was the comparative study of 
religion and folklore which American Judaism accepted and thus 
established the conviction that these ceremonials were exhausted. 

The preoccupation of these sciences was in a measure concern- 
ing the origin of rite and ritual. Many a ceremony believed 


280 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


to have been of Hebrew device and institution given by Law 
divinely revealed, was disclosed to be of universal prevalence. 
These religious rites expressed certain primitive conceits 
whereby men at a certain stage of religious and ethnic develop- 
ment were enslaved in will and fancy and betokened the limited 
range of their knowledge and intelligence at that age. This 
had a decisive bearing on the ritual appointments of our Ameri- 
can synagogs. When the question of retaining or abrogating a 
rite was under debate the conclusion of love, anthropology— 
comparative religions were borne in mind.1* The precedent for 
abolishing** a custom of the synagog, such as the segregation of 
sexes, dietary laws, philacteries, ritual baths, or whatever other 
taboo it might have been, was sustained by referring to the 
deductions of the sciences concerned and furthermore by citing 
the practice*® of modification and amplification of rabbinical laws 
to adjust them to the exigencies of the day which had prevailed 
among the codifier of rabbinical laws and ordinances in other 
eras. 

Scholars after the order of Leopold Zunz and Abraham Geiger 
had shown that Jewish history was a process, a progressive 
onmarch from crude fetishes and bungling concepts to a more 
lucidly unfolding truth. The prayer book, as Zunz explained, 
was the register of this groping within the soul of Israel for 
ampler and fuller life. These men revered tradition, but were 
not enslaved by it. Tradition, they showed, was not super- 
imposed on Israel from without or from above, but in all cases 
was a slow growth from within the soul of the Jewish people 
and coming from stages below the present era on which decisions 
were made which were transmitted to succeeding generations. 
Hence the “chain of tradition” held together the peoples of 
many eras and decades. In all these periods certain eliminations 
of ritual were made and constant adaptation of originally non- 
Jewish rites in the synagog and how these were reshaped to 
symbolize new Jewish ideas and convictions. 

The Sabbath, for instance, is borrowed, possibly from Baby- 
lonia. Prophetic Judaism invested this day with a new content 
as explained in another chapter. The dietary regulations which 

* Pittsburgh Platform, C.C.A.R. of 1885. 

“Consult Frazer’s Folk-Lore and Old Testament on “Seething a Kid 
in the Milk of Its Mother” as an illustration of precedent. 


* None of these practices are strictly or originally Hebraic, but general, 
even universal in prehistoric society. 


OE ea eee eee. 


— oe 


THE NEXT STAGE IN DEVELOPMENT 281 


were in many cults primarily binding on the priesthood alone 
were later appropriated to the priest-people as distinctive marks 
of their separation from other peoples. Later generations 
observed these dietary laws not for sanctification but for them- 
selves, regardless of their origin and purpose. 

American Judaism is not likely to be disturbed by reactionary 
tendencies prevalent today and clamorous for a return to the 
“spirituality” of the old regime, since it is built up on scientific 
foundations. Nor will it yield to nationalism which is sympto- 
matic of another passion characteristic of the latter part of the 
nineteenth century. A truer appreciation of human worth 
loathes to appraise the value of men, or determine their natural 
loyalty, one of the aberrations of war hysteria, in accordance 
with radical qualities inherent in their blood. This race fana- 
ticism has proven to be the most perilous obsession to which 
men have succumbed in modern times.7* The Jew, in particular, 
has been victimized by it since the dictates of this dogma of 
pseudo-science rated the Semite, meaning thereby the Jew, below 
the superior classification assigned the Indo-Germanic races. 
The anti-Semite is equipped for his slander with the rusty 
weapons taken from the antiquated arsenal of this spurious 
anthropology which rates races from the angle of the dogma 
and not deed. 

Among the first of European nations to apply racial theories 
to politics was France. The role to be played by the Latin races 
was caste by this nation which applied racialism to politics. 
This application of race theories to national destinies was the 
forerunner of the various political programs crystalizing in that 
frenzied conflict for trade, which was later converted into the 
agonies suffered by all the world, and is accountable for the 
untimely death of ten million young men. Racialism has been 
responsible for the bastard brood of Pan-Latinism, Anglo-Sax- 
onism, Pan-Teutonism, Pan-Slavism, and that most venomous 
infection, Anti-Semitism, which is slaughtering its holocaust of 
Jews. 

The fatal error in this doctrine of racialism is its method of 
operating on unproven theories instead of scientific facts. Its 
very terminology is vague, such as the modern term “Nordic.” 
No two authorities agree on what constitutes a race. In our 


* Note the invention of spurious anthropology to defend alleged but 
unfounded “Nordic” races. 


282 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


present civilization no pure race may be found.’? Take for 
instance that group from which the Jews sprung. Historical 
evidence abounds that the Hebrew race, so-called, has as liber- 
ally and fruitfully absorbed non-Hebrew elements and com- 
ponents as have other races.** To the seed of Abraham has been 
given qualities which are keenly responsive to the monotheistic 
construction of life and the world. This interpretation of the 
world in terms of a unified process, including a kinship of man 
based on mutual aid, is the distinctiveness of the Jew. But in 
the course of his age-long pilgrimage he has appropriated ideas 
taken from other peoples, such as art, philosophy, science, com- 
merce as understood today. For the Jewish people it is not an 
obsession that because of their monotheistic construction of the 
world, they are superior to all other people and consequently 
an exclusive or clannish sect. The roots of American Judaism 
are not imbedded in such quicksand but reared on the firm 
foundation of democracy and commonsense such as that exhi- 
bited by the Pharisees. 


Nationalism, however, is the ruling passion of the day. This 
doctrine pretends to ascribe noble birth to those whose claim 
of pride and presumption is attested by forged documents of 
their superior endowments such as the “Nordics.” It would 
have been a miracle had Jewry not been visited by an epidemic 
of nationalism, too. Zionism is an offspring of nationalism and 
nationalism is largely the precipitate of hatred and arrogance. 


Jewish nationalism, under the bitterness revoked by anti- 
Jewish nationalism everywhere the world over, utilized an old 
sentiment, the love of Zion slumbering in the soul of Israel, as 
a medium of propaganda. Orthodox Judaism prayed and waited 
for the national resurrection of Israel ever since the Roman 
legions razed the temple at Jerusalem. But in Rabbinical ortho- 
doxy the national restoration of a race was not an end, as 
modern Zionists demand, but a means. Exiled from Palestine, 
Orthodox Judaism was bereft of the sacrificial rites prescribed; 
to discharge these and not the self-determination of a race, was 
their ambition. Exile or “Golah” was a divinely ordained 
punishment for sin, they argued, and while Israel was in that 
state, Jewry was therefore under probation. It was even not 


“In H. G. Wells’ Outline of History, the interdependency of races is 
fully shown. 


7% All western civilizations have absorbed the Old Testament. 





THE NEXT STAGE IN DEVELOPMENT 283 


their business to make an effort to end the sorrowful day of 
exile. God alone could decree the termination thereof in His 
own good time. According to “the way of a sign,’ by means 
of a miracle, this exile would come to an end. This method 
does not accord with political agitation of the past few decades. 
Organization of the restoration of the ancient patrimony was 
not the way of orthodox Judaism, as it is of the modern. 


The Jewish nationalists have no portion in American Judaism 
nor have they any patience with this religious philosophy of 
orthodoxy anent Zionism. They have spurned the notion that 
the genius of the Jewish people came to full flower in the unfold- 
ing of his religious convictions regarding service toward man- 
kind, that this is the distinction of Judaism from other cultures, 
namely, the emphasis and stress on the religio-ethical. The 
monotheistic outlook they discard in toto. Due to this construc- 
tion placed on Judaism by American rabbis, it is not a religion 
or a church in the sense in which Christianity is both a church 
and a religion. The Jew combines a religion and a group con- 
sciousness dedicated to a cause. The Jews in this country, in 
particular, are conscious of the fact that they are a people, a 
group historically differentiated from other groups and orien- 
tated by certain religio-ethical concepts of God, man and the 
world and the particular service demanded of the Jew towards 
his humanity.?® 

By insisting on this fact, they are a historical people bound 
by a common destiny to become purveyors of universal ideals of 
brotherhood and peace, justice and love, the Jewish people stand 
for more than is connoted by the term, Nation. There are 
nations that are not wholly one people. They are peoples who 
are nationally disunited, like Switzerland or Russia. We have 
become Jews by birth, not by confession of articles of belief, 
just as by birth the natives of this land become American. 


There is no conflict and clash between the group conscious- 
ness of the American Jews,”° and their national consciousness 
which is theirs by virtue of their birth on the free soil or by 
adoption of America as their political identity. American Juda- 


® This view pervades Kohler’s “Theology of Judaism” and characterized 
the preaching of E. G, Hirsch, Max Landsberg ,and the Reform Rabbis as 
a whole. 

” This group consciousness is motivated by tradition and reason. When 
manifested the religion of the Jews of America is found to enhance and 
inspire service in terms of citizenship. 


284 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


ism will therefore not pact with a conception of existence which 
refuses to recognize that the group consciousness of the Jew 
is manifested in loyal service to America as an expression of 
his religion. He has ever held before him the thought that the 
Jews are destined to be a light unto the nations, which in this 
country requires him to give time, talent and treasure to the 
national good. In that light he still appeals for peace among 
his humanity, that men be drawn together instead of parted. 


It is not along the line of nationalism and the resurrection 
of Hebrew as a spoken language for a small nation in a corner 
of anterior Asia that the Jew has been summoned in this war- 
fare of humanity. The purpose of his survival is to witness to 
the doings of God who made man in His own image and a 
“partner” with Him in the process of creation, that by his life 
all men may learn to love one another. 


Persistent as Jewish reactionaries are in upholding their 
panacea of a national revival and resurrection, the development 
of Judaism in the United States is not along these travelled 
roads. The original contributions made by Judaism to the 
treasure-house of vital ideas is the prophetic emphasis on right- 
eousness, justice and mercy. This contribution is not yet com- 
plete, but is in a process of outflowing today, as of old. It is for 
us to ascertain wherein this revelation is manifest in our genera- 
tion. It will be found in the social conscience, collective action, 
and in the protest against the enslavement of our citizens. 


To the Torah which Israel is still writing, a new chapter on 
health, joy and success is to be added, as a regular portion of 
man’s inalienable right. The next stage of Judaism in America 
is certain to make room for the modern insistence on health 
as an essential condition of adequate living, and for such social 
and collective action as will make it possible for all to obtain 
healthy environment. As Rabbi Alfred G. Moses says in his 
book on “Jewish Science:” No adherent of Judaism need step 
out of the portals of his faith to find these truths, “namely that 
God is the Creator, the supreme mind, and that God is spirit, 
love, goodness.” “It is passing strange,” he adds, “that Jews 
should so flagrantly disregard their own gospel to enter cults 
that simply reword the original Jewish thought—the central 
truth of divine unity and creativeness is the intuition of Jewish 
genius.” 


There is a menacing drift to other cults of healing from the 


THE NEXT STAGE IN DEVELOPMENT | 285 


synagog.”* Some seeking social distinction join these cults which 
have not thus far been guilty of persecuting the Jews.?? By 
affiliating with these new cults an alleged prestige of liberality 
is gained, so it is presumed. Admitting that the sincere secession- 
ists outnumber the social climbers, these new cults are under 
the ban of Judaism because they are anti-Jewish.2* None of 
them contain truths whose glow extends beyond the reach of 
Judaism’s vision. God’s creation of the world and the inherent 
goodness of the world are Jewish conceptions, as has been 
explained. When the goodness or harmony prevailing in the 
universe is stressed in modern cults as the essential tenet of 
the new faith, the devotee receives no blessing of joy of success 
denied him in his synagog wherein he has been taught the good- 
ness of the Lord whose mercy is everlasting. And good health 
becomes his portion who willingly follows the law of the Lord 
as American Judaism constructs it. Each one enters into a 
spiritual enrapportment with God when responsive to one’s own 
nature, one carries out one’s own personal destiny.** Nothing 
is so hygienic as the satisfaction of materializing ideas and ideals 
in obedience to one’s inner light. These truths are taught of 
Judaism. Who lays hold of them approaches Divine Unity, and 
shares the blessings of the All-Giving and Forgiving Father. 
Again potentialities of healing are inherent in Judaism. Rabbi 
Moses avers our synagog has neglected “soul culture” and the 
practical message of Judaism on every day life has not been 
taught. They, the rabbis, stress “that God is one but fail to 
bring out that he is the Power that makes for life and well- 
being.” * * * “When our Jewish pulpits sound in the clear tones 
the note that God is the Healer of the sick of His people, then 


“There is no doctrinal objection to the preachment of health in the 
synagog. Holiness includes the totality of man’s existence and to obtain 
holiness or wholesomeness represents the motive of the Jewish religion 
on the side of religion and doctrine. Whatever protest has been regis- 
tered by the Jewish pulpit against the various health cults and physical 
culture fads has been based on the sound policy of opposing a selfish 
practice. An exclusive doctrine of well-being does not take into account 
the equally vital necessity of well-doing, and to do well has been rated 
by the wise men of Israel as of more importance than to be merely well. 

There is little doubt that many Jews join Christian Science churches 
for social prestige. 

3 The subject has been treated in full (Yr. Bk. C.C.A.R., Vol. 22, p. 300): 
“The attitude of Judaism toward Christian Science.” 

*“The inventor has a temperament attuned to the temperament of 
nature.’—Havelock Ellis. 


286 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


the affirmations of this factor of healing in the Bible and in 
Post-Biblical literature will counteract the drift.” It may call 
forth a Jewish science using that word science in the technical 
sense devised by other cults. The thesis, that mind influences 
body, cannot be denied. The body is the “extension of the 
mind,” and its status is determined by various moods, emotions 
and sentiments. Our conduct is the direct reaction of our soul’s 
dictates, whether for good or evil, well-being or sickness, success 
or failure. Whatever state or disease we experience can be 
traced to our enrapportment with God or our lack of harmony 
with the universal laws of the world that restore and make sure 
our appointment on this earth. 


Our divine heritage is the soul. Coming pure from the source 
of creation, it unites us with all that lives and partakes of the 
universe. By means of our souls, we have dominion over the 
beast of the field and the fowl of the air. Our soul is a mani- 
festation of divine energy. Harmonizing our inner impulse or 
energy with the cosmic urge or universal energy, we outdraw 
the forces inherent in us. Moved by these universal currents, 
we partake of the world. We become God-like, being in all 
things and partaking of all that is. At one with the source of 
being we merge with the elemental Oneness and are identified 
with it. In this espousal there is neither severance nor dissen- 
sion, good nor evil, health nor sickness; but a serenity of spirit 
breathing the calmness of setting sun and harmonizing us with 
the universal will as shadows unite at the footsteps of night. 


Conceding to Judaism the psychic process, but not the tech- 
nique or healing and happiness which this religious revelation 
contains, the genius of the religion was never expressed in these 
terms alone. The Jew has always set a very high value of life 
because life was to witness to God and to sanctify Him. The 
Jew believes in safety first as a rule of conduct for all, and in 
guarding health. Life is holy since it is to him the impress 
of God’s handiwork along with sun and stars. Hence the lives 
of all people are as sacred and holy as that particular segment 
which includes himself. The Jew is concerned in realizing his 
own life and equally solicitous of his humanity of which he 
partakes by virtue of living on this earth with them, a co-worker 
with all men in making earth livable. 

To this end he does not dedicate himself exclusively to the 
selfish or the self-centered goal of obtaining by psychic processes 


THE NEXT STAGE IN DEVELOPMENT 287 


ef consciousness or subconsciousness a complete and perfect 
enrapportment with God, the All-Father. This attainment of 
a state of Atonement is the reaction or outcome of action done 
in accordance with the Divine Will and cannot be sought as an 
exercise of emotion detached from service.. The protest of the 
Jew against Christian Science rests on this basis, mainly, that 
Christian Science is essentially selfishness. This cult is unrelated 
to social service. It does not, for example, help anybody out of 
employment or any one who is overcome by adversity. It has 
thus far failed to serve any cause that embraces the welfare of 
a group nor would it ameliorate the harshness of that struggle 
for existence in which the vast host of humanity are engaged. 
It is not even religious or ethical in the sense Judaism is both. 
Its essence is not conduct, a discipline or ethics, but mere health- 
fulness, a state of physical comfort for the affluent, opulent and 
optimistic. The followers of this cult do not primarily seek to 
live the right ethical life, but to prolong their own lives as if a 
prolongation of one’s individual existence were the summum 
bonum of existence and not the contribution one makes to human 
welfare the test of life. 


As Dr. Stephen Wise said, Christian Science is a “religion of 
comfort for the well-to-do rather than like the religion of Israel, 
a constraint to do well. Its everlasting command is: Thou 
canst get well, rather than, Thou shalt do well. The great word 
of Judaism is justice or righteousness between man and man. 
The great word of Christianity is love. The great word of 
science is health.” 


Mere health, it is true, is not the goal of Judaism. Happiness 
is not the sacramental consecration of the Jew either. More 
than either of these pursuits the Jew seeks to be worthy. A 
life of worth and worthiness he would make of his existence, 
and he who so lives, enjoys riches and honor, so the Jew believes 
and acts. Furthermore, Judaism is a religion that accepts reality 
and does not screen the facts of existence. God created all 
things and beings and these are the products of divine intelli- 
gence, too. These realities of the objective world are known 
through forms of time and space and can not be dismissed as 
errors of mortal mind, because perchance these may be pleasant 
to see or work with. Man is surrounded by a world of actuality, 
to which he must adjust himself. This world makes demands 
of him and exacts a just measure from him in terms of service, 


288 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


which is labor. In order that he may get, he must give. Life 
is a process of reciprocity, mutuality, as well as adjustment, and 
this striving entails struggle. No magic phrase or mystic chant 
will annul the evil that abounds in the world whether that evil 
be disease or man’s inhumanity towards his fellow-man, unless 
man, through labor, banishes it or subdues it. There is only one 
thing to be done with evil, granted there is a certain unanimity 
of opinion, a consensus as to what is evil, and that is to battle 
with it personally and collectively, now and ever. 

And as for pain, which in Christian Science the healer strives 
to absolve, there should be a prayer in their service reading 
somewhat like this: “Blessed art Thou, Creator of the Universe, 
who uses pain and pang as a signal for foreboding of evil.” 
Bodily pains are veritable warnings of danger, and {foretell dire 
consequences. Heeded, they spare. Neglected, they destroy. 
To eliminate pain is to court peril. To make one impervious or 
oblivious to pain is to fly in the face of nature, which is not 
hoodooed by wordy formulas and is not under the bondage of 
phrases, as most cults of this sort. 

Incessant struggle is our price for life, and the achievements 
of the race obligate us to do our part today that those who come 
after us may benefit. Judaism in America proposed to use those 
aids of stimulation radiating from the Jewish conception of health 
and healing, for the purpose of strengthening each one who 
inherited duties imposed by his Jewish birth to do his manly 
part as a valiant champion in waging the combat against injus- 
tice, error, ignorance. He must do his part in this world of 
realities whether or not they contribute to his comfort—usually 
they do not. To shirk them by apostacy is to be most despised 
in America, a quitter and rejected of all men as a coward. 

The unfolding years call for direct action on the part of men 
and women of good will, who would have peace established on 
earth. The preachment of ethics as a system of belief, even the 
monotheistic concept of the world, is not sufficient, because 
Judaism is more than a religion. A religion draws up a scheme 
of belief, a creed. Accepting these articles of faith, one becomes 
a follower of that religion for the time being. It is an act of 
one’s will or emotion, but does not embrace one’s descendants. 
The Jewish people are involved in a cause affecting all humanity. 
Their destiny is contained in their Jewish birth, which endowed 
them with a consciousness which they manifest and are obligated 
to stimulate. But this consciousness is ethical in its manifesta- 


THE NEXT STAGE IN DEVELOPMENT 289 


tion and to make it real, American Jews will participate more 
fully in the affairs of their fellow-citizens. Ethics unrelated to 
politics and economics is as meaningless as the wailing before 
the fragment of the old Temple Wall. Religion concerns busi- 
ness, the social group as well as the individual. The conflict 
today rages about this expansion. 


The report of the committee on Social Justice adopted by the 
Central Conference of American Rabbis at a recent session, 
voices with manly sincerity the ardent conviction of those 
teachers of American Judaism.”® These American rabbis have 
inherited the ethico-historical destiny of Israel first announced 
by their prophetic ancestors. Israel is destined to be servant of 
Yahweh. This is his career. He is to become a light to the 
nations in their human relationships, particularly on the plane 
of industry. It is thoroughly in keeping with the religious 
ambition of Judaism to illustrate in industrial and business con- 
duct those ethical concepts of considerateness which have been 
identified with Israel since that day the law went forth out of 
Zion and the word of God from Jerusalem. Poets and sages of 
Israel interpreted God in the actions of man. The love of God 
is a synonym for the love of man. Insofar as man loved his 
fellow-men and behaved according to this reverence for his 
humanity, did he actually trust and believe in God. Man cannot 
serve God without serving man. 


American Judaism would be without vital significance were 
its teaching and preachment dissociated with concrete social, 
industrial and economic situations. In the near future the exploi- 
tations, maladjustments, the terrible inequalities of distribution 
arising from the economic status, must be dealt with directly 
under the sanction of Judaism as the fulfillment of religious 
duties as sacred as the performance of those rites which char- 
acterized Jewish worship. In the adjustment of economic rela- 
tions there must be a more vigorous participation of American 
Judaism directly in human relationship. The enslavement of 
man under whatever form, political or economic, calls for release. 
There can be no real democracy without economic liberation. 
Judaism with a flaming sword of justice battles for release from 
debasement and defilement of the human being through eco- 
nomic tyranny and the entrenchment of privilege and vested 
interests, and no one denies that our present industrial order 


® Yr. Bk. C.C.A.R., Vol. 33, p. 241. 


290 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


permits slavery and every sort of debasement. The drift in 
economic thinking by modern economists, such as Veblin, 
exposes these tyrannies in our economic system. 

Our present industrial order is based on personal profit. It 
is esentially a selfish scheme which denies to humanity certain 
inalienable conditions. It does not concede the prerogative of 
health, even as an essentiality of human needs. The sanctity 
of life has to be safeguarded by long and persistent legisla- 
tive measures, against which even the hand of the Law is arrayed; 
humanitarian measures, such as Child Labor and a Minimum 
Wage law. A system of economics founded on individual com- 
petition has served the purpose of liberating man from a pre- 
vious thraldom, it is admitted. But now that earth is partially 
subdued, organization in production and distribution must dis- 
place chaotic competition for profit only. Collective organized 
industry must be installed, and production for use fostered to 
enable each of earth’s children to enjoy a decent respect among 
men as a fellow worker with others, and not as a chattel to be 
exploited. Labor has the right to bargain collectively in the 
various labor organizations, through representatives of their 
own choosing, on the assumption that Labor is not a commodity 
but a human life. In return for the recognition, labor will be 
in the disposition to enter into managerial responsibility, a par- 
ticipant, not a mechanism, in production. A closer affiliation of 
employer and employee in both production and distribution is 
necessary, and it is the bounden duty of American Judaism to 
officially announce this policy and to bring it to pass by direct 
effort and action.?¢ 


* Summary of Declarations on Social Justice by the Central Conference 
of American Rabbis, 1920: 

(1) The Conference recognizes the right of Labor to organize and to 
bargain collectively through representatives of its own choosing, in order 
to secure its rights at the hands of employers. It calls upon Labor as 
well as Capital to exhaust all the resources of peaceable settlement before 
resorting to the strike or lockout. It maintains that the welfare of the 
public should take precedence over the interests of any class or classes. 

(2) The Conference condemns any and all violations of Law and all 
defiance of constituted authority, and declares its faith in the adequacy of 
the peaceful Constitutional processes by which changes may be brought 
about. At the same time, the Conference asserts the right of all citizens 
to strive for changes in the Law and to protest against abuses of power 
and of Constitutional rights. It declares its abhorrence of all interfer- 
ences, whether by private citizens or by officials, with the exercise of free- 
dom of speech, oral or written, and of freedom of assemblage, both of 
which are guaranteed by the Constitution. And it further condemns the 


THE NEXT STAGE IN DEVELOPMENT 291 


It is for American Judaism to denounce the use of violence 
in the settlement of industrial disputes and strikes, just as the 
Quakers have taken their stand against all forms and practices 
of warfare. So might American Jews, who were the world’s 
first pacifists. It is within the sphere of Jewish duties to 
attempt to establish an eight-hour day. To engage with those 
laboring to abolish child labor, and to assist in the enactment of 
legislation that will provide the worker with adequate compen- 
sation in cases of industrial accidents, occupational diseases, old 
age and unemployment, and a minimum wage for men and 
women. 

The foregoing are a few of the industrial situations in our 
day. It is needless that more be detailed. In maintaining an 
attitude of humane consideration towards the worker exploited 
by a brutal, a selfish industrialism, and heartlessness, there is 
being crystallized the ethics of American Judaism, which is 


use of private police under the guise of and in the capacity of public 
administrators of the Law as tyrannical and conducive to injustice and 
violence. 

(3) The Conference holds that the following industrial norms are ax- 
iomatic: the eight-hour day as the maximum for all industrial workers; 
a compulsory one-day-of-rest in seven; regulation of industrial conditions 
to secure for all workers a safe and sanitary working environment; abo- 
lition of child-labor; adequate workingmen’s compensation for industrial 
accidents and occupational diseases and provision for the contingencies 
of unemployment and old age. 

(4) The Conference views with dismay the attempt on the part of some 
employers in the period of post-war deflation to break down industrial 
standards which are essential to the well-being of the employe. It rec- 
ognizes that the changed economic conditions require numerous readjust- 
ments of wages without any diminution of production. But there are 
standards in the industrial world, which after years of effort and struggle, 
have been established as necessary for human welfare. The Conference 
condemns any decrease of wages to a point lower than is consistent with 
a proper standard of living for the worker and his family, and any in- 
crease in the length of the working day beyond that which has been 
accepted as the maximum. The Conference urges all leaders of industry to 
maintain these just and humane standards both as a matter of justice and 
as a condition of industrial peace. 

(5) The Conference advocates that the National, State and Municipal 
authorities create free employment bureaus, the operation of which shall 
be coordinated and standardized in a thorough-going manner; and it fur- 
ther advocates that a co-operative study of Unemployment Insurance be 
undertaken by Labor, Industry and Government with a view of evolving 
a plan of Insurance which will protect Labor in periods of enforced idle- 
ness. 

(6) The Conference declares its abhorrence of lynching and denounces 
all who participate in and abet this brutal practice. It advocates legisla- 
tion which shall make lynching a Federal offense. 


292 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


asserting the dictates of humanity, in social and industrial rela- 
tions. Belief in God is a mockery, unless translated into conse- 
quent regard of each individual for his brother; into responsi- 
bility towards his fellow human beings. City, state, nation, are 
only collections of units of human beings, who must be regarded 
as mortals, not abstractions. The foundations of the republic 
are endangered unless there is a more pervasive recognition of 
the individual’s humanity, which is the essence of democracy. 


To avert this impending doom is the purpose the Jew serves. 
He teaches love of man, not the enslavement of man. According 
to a will transcending his own, the Jew has been ordained to 
establish this love of man for his neighbor, that together they 
may labor to render earth habitable and pleasant. To this end 
must he persist until man unlearns his inhumanity towards his 
fellow-men. The martyr’s role is his, but heroically must he 
bear his assignment, that from his life men take increased devo- 
tion towards their fellow-beings. And this is a world of workers. 


Work is a holy business. It is not intended to be the drudgery 
ofa slave. No drudgery is blessed. Work is not intended to be 


a Slave’s assignment, but a joy, and it can be a common joy when 
together men labor for a common good or purpose. More joy 
is to abound in the world for those who go to their work in the 
morning and toil until the end of the day. To make this possible 
is the task of Judaism in America for the coming years. 

The technique of this social functioning has not been yet 
developed in full, but social conscience, as it is called, registers 
the desire and from this anxiety there will evolve the various 
means and methods of fulfillment. Prudential reasons can no 
longer restrain the rabbis from discharging the intent of the 
social justice prayer of their Day of Atonement service. The 
social creed of the churches, as Dr. Cronbach proves in his 
elaborate study of that theme that therein “Angelican agrees 
with Catholic, Catholic with Quaker, Quaker with Baptist, and 
Baptist with Jew. The brotherhood of man takes shape amid 
the work that the brotherhood of man inspires.”?7 Naturally. 
Nothing is so important to man as how to live, and there is a 
growing conviction that under the present industrial system 
no one lives a normal, complete and self-realizing existence. 
There is likewise a conviction that can not be stayed nor bludg- 
eoned into forgetfulness, that the present order of society fol- 


* Social Creed of the Churches, Year Book, Vol. 33. 


THE NEXT STAGE IN DEVELOPMENT 293 


lows the process of decay and decline that attends every little 
system. It, too, was an outgrowth and a sequence of a former 
industrial state, and it, too, tends to disappear or become 
absorbed in another order or process. There is no denial that 
the social order of the future will be less individualistic. What- 
ever label attached to it in the order of society which is to 
succeed the present, service not self will be the sacramental 
word, which is merely recasting the love of man for man. 

To incarnate these ideas in action requires an organization. 
Gradually these ideas, born of the social conscience of the age, 
are being transmuted into action. There is a perceptible adapta- 
tion, now reluctantly assumed, of these ideas based on the 
doctrines preached by religion, particularly those influenced by 
Judaism. One dare not become optimistic, since there are so 
many frightful and flagrant frustrations of religion. Still stands 
the ancient sacrifice of service and love, as the immutable obli- 
gation of man and these were the words felt to be quick with life 
in our own day that prompted the Conference of American 
Rabbis, a representative body of our own era, to set forth their 
social creed. The future of Judaism will be fashioned after this 
pronouncement. It is not a new, nor is it a radical departure 
from the path Israel has ever trodden. It is the way of the 
Torah. 

Judaism would have no basis whereon to stand, were the 
teachers of Israel deprived of a platform dealing concretely with 
the industrial, social and economic problems of our own day, and 
the situations arising therefrom. For these are the vital contests 
and controversies of our age. Judaism was the first among 
religions of the western world to advocate the principles of 
justice. To do justly is rated by the rabbis as the virtue most 
akin to godliness. No truth has the preachment of Judaism 
forced home with more telling effect than the conviction that 
insofar as man serves and labors with his humanity for their 
common good, he has labored for God and executed His will. 
These are the truths Judaism has ever taught. The Torah begins 
and ends with deeds of loving kindness: God clothed the naked 
in Eden and buried the body of Moses. In their pictorial way, the 
sages of the Talmud stated the front and base of the Jewish 
religion. Their insistence of deeds of loving kindness as the 
essential motive of the Jewish religion vitalized it. In the 
generation now coming to consciousness, the application of this 
construction will be the next step of religious activity. As their 


294 AMERICAN JUDAISM 


fathers freed Judaism from rabbinism, the children of this age 
will free it from mere doctrinal expression or ecclesiasticalism 
and set it to enhallow their own lives and that of their humanity, 
by freeing them and all the sons of man from the slavery of 
despotism in the economic realm, or in any other realm that 
holds sovereignty over the sons of man. 






































